How to Preheat a Pampered Chef Air Fryer – Easy Guide

You’ve just read an awesome sounding recipe, but it called for you to preheat your air fryer. Now, you’re staring at it trying to figure out what that means. Don’t worry, today I’ll teach you how to preheat a Pampered Chef air fryer so you’ll be cooking in no time.

Whether you lost or tossed the manual, or got a unit secondhand without one, this is actually a common thing. However, preheating an air fryer is really easy, and you’ll be a pro in no time.

Once you’re ready to cook, check out our best Pampered Chef air fryer recipes to try some new favorites!

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How Do I Preheat My Pampered Chef Air Fryer?

  1. Plug the power cord into the wall outlet
  2. Press the power button to turn the air fryer on
  3. If you will be using a tray or basket, make sure that is inserted into the air fryer
  4. Press the ‘Custom’ button on the top left corner of the digital menu
  5. Now, rotate the central power button clockwise to set the timer to 2 minutes
  6. Short press the power button again to switch to temperature
  7. Rotate the power button clockwise again to set the temperature you’d like to preheat your Pampered Chef air fryer to
  8. Once correct, press the power wheel again to start
  9. After the cooking cycle finishes, your Pampered Chef air fryer is preheated

The reason that you insert the trays or baskets in during preheat is to help them get warm as well. It will result in crispier food during the cooking process.

However, if you’re nervous about placing food on hot trays, it may be skipped. You may need to flip your food during cooking to help it crisp evenly, though.

As long as you’re not cooking bagel bites in the air fryer you’ll be fine (no one likes spilled cheese)!

Do You Have to Preheat the Pampered Chef Air Fryer?

No, you don’t have to preheat the Pampered Chef air fryer. However, it is recommended, at least on the air fryer setting.

The rotisserie, for example, will cook low and slow, so preheating doesn’t make much of a difference there. I don’t see much difference when it comes to using reheat or dehydrate either.

In particular, the air fry cooking function is designed to use hot air to rapidly cook and crisp. If the air fryer is not preheated, you’ll need to add an additional 1-2 minutes to get it up to temperature before it starts cooking per the recipe directions.

Imagine biting into a frozen onion ring cooked in the air fryer only to find the middle still cold. No thanks!

Think of your air fryer like a small convection oven (well, because it is). If you don’t preheat your range oven and throw a frozen pizza in, it will still cook. It’s just going to take longer than what it says on the box because you’re starting from a cold oven.

If you have a different brand of air fryer from Pampered Chef, the concept is the same but the method may differ. Check out our guide on how to preheat a Ninja air fryer to see another option.

Final Thoughts

While you don’t absolutely need to preheat your Pampered Chef air fryer, it’s easy to do so and only takes a couple minutes.

In fact, I’ll just set it while I’m cutting up veggies or seasoning my meat and it’s ready to go by the time I am.

At the end of the day, it ends up saving me about a minute, but I also find less of a need to flip items when I’m air frying. That’s one of the perks of a Pampered Chef Deluxe air fryer to begin with!

When you’re batch cooking french toast sticks in the air fryer that’ll save you some real time!

Katie Vine