The first time I heard the soft “ding” of this strange, cube-shaped appliance on my counter, I wasn’t expecting much. Another gadget, I thought, next to the trusty air fryer that’s been overworking for years on sad batches of frozen fries. Ten minutes later, I had a whole-roasted chicken, crisp on the outside, juicy to the bone, and a tray of vegetables that actually tasted like something.
That was the night the air fryer quietly got pushed to the back of the cupboard.
Because this thing doesn’t just fry. It bakes, steams, grills, slow-cooks, sears, proofs dough, reheats without drying, and can even sous-vide if you want to get fancy.
All from one slightly humming box on your kitchen counter.
From “air fryer phase” to real all-in-one cooking
Look around any small kitchen today and you’ll find the same scene. A tired toaster, a bulky air fryer, maybe a rice cooker, a slow cooker gathering dust, plus a stack of pans that don’t quite fit in the cupboard. It’s the visual proof of how cooking has become a puzzle of devices.
Then you meet this new generation of multi-cooker that goes far beyond frying. One device, nine ways to cook: air fry, bake, roast, grill, steam, sauté, slow-cook, reheat, even dehydrate or sous-vide depending on the model. It quietly swallows the role of half your appliances without shouting about it.
Suddenly, the air fryer looks a bit one-dimensional.
A friend of mine, living in a 25 m² studio with a kitchenette the size of a large cutting board, summed it up perfectly. “I used to juggle a saucepan on one hob and a cheap air fryer for everything else. The day I brought this multi-cooker home, I gave away my microwave and my rice cooker. I haven’t missed them once.”
She now roasts sweet potatoes while steaming salmon, in the same device, one after the other, without washing three different things. Sunday, she proofed a small focaccia dough using the gentle low-heat mode, then switched to baking. The bread came out golden and surprisingly airy for a student flat with no oven.
Her air fryer? Sitting on top of the wardrobe “just in case,” untouched for months.
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What’s really going on here is simple. The first wave of air fryers solved one problem: how to get crispy food fast, with less oil. Great for nuggets and fries, less great for, well, everything else.
The nine-in-one multi-cooker solves a broader pain. It merges dry heat (like an oven), humid heat (like a steamer or slow cooker), and intense direct heat (like a frying pan or grill), then wraps it all in preset programs a tired brain can handle on a weeknight. *You’re not just replacing an air fryer; you’re questioning why you needed so many separate appliances in the first place.*
Once you get a taste of a device that roasts a chicken, steams broccoli, reheats pizza properly, and simmers a curry overnight, “air fryer only” starts to feel oddly limited.
Nine cooking methods, one countertop: how to actually use it
The magic isn’t in owning a nine-function gadget, it’s in making those nine functions work for your real, messy life. The first step is to pick three modes you’ll actually use this week. For most people, that’s **air fry**, **steam**, and **slow cook**.
Start simple. Air fry some vegetables with a drizzle of oil and a pinch of salt. Then, on another day, steam fish with lemon and herbs. Over the weekend, throw beans, tomatoes, and spices into the slow-cook mode in the morning and come home to a thick chili.
Once those three become muscle memory, you add baking or grilling. Little by little, the device turns from “intimidating robot” into “automatic second pair of hands.”
The biggest trap with these all-in-one cookers is trying to use every feature on day one. You scroll the manual, feel overwhelmed, and end up reheating leftovers on the same setting for three weeks. We’ve all been there, that moment when ambition meets Tuesday-night exhaustion.
The other common mistake is treating it exactly like an air fryer. Cranking up the temperature, overcrowding the basket, then wondering why your food steams instead of crisps. One plain-truth sentence: nobody really reads the cooking charts every single day.
So you cheat a little. You tape your three favorite time/temperature combos to the side of the machine. You learn how your device behaves, not just what the manual says. Suddenly your vegetables stop burning, your chicken stops drying out, and your patience comes back.
A home cook I interviewed recently told me, “The day I stopped trying to follow ‘perfect’ recipes and started treating my multi-cooker like a helpful but slightly stubborn friend, everything clicked. I learned its hot spots, its quirks, and now I trust it with dinner when I’m on the sofa answering emails.”
- Use the right mode for the right job
Air fry for crispiness, steam for tenderness, slow cook or sous-vide for deep flavor. Each function has its personality, and fighting it usually ends in disappointment. - Think in layers, not chaos
Cook in stages. Roast the vegetables first, then use the residual heat to keep them warm while you sear or grill. One pot, but not all at once. - Clean as you go, lightly
A quick wipe of the basket or pot between modes saves you from burnt crumbs and strange smells. Two minutes now, less swearing tomorrow. - Trust presets, then adjust
Start with preset programs to avoid guesswork, then shave off or add a few minutes based on what you see, smell, and hear. Your nose is a better sensor than any app. - Let it replace, not add
Every time you love a function, ask yourself: which old gadget can leave the kitchen? The goal isn’t more stuff, it’s fewer decisions and clearer counters.
Goodbye single-use gadgets, hello calmer kitchens
The quiet revolution of this nine-in-one device is not that it fries better than your air fryer. Sometimes it will, sometimes it won’t. The real shift is mental: you stop organizing your cooking around a clutter of small machines and start thinking in terms of one versatile “hub” that adapts to your day.
One night it behaves like an oven for a tray of quick-roasted vegetables. The next morning, it’s a gentle steamer for breakfast eggs. Sunday, it’s a slow cooker bubbling away in the background while you live your life. Then, in the middle of the week, it rescues that half-soggy slice of pizza and brings it back to life with a crispy edge.
Once you’ve experienced that kind of flexibility, the old air fryer starts to feel like a flip phone in a smartphone world. Functional, familiar, but strangely limited.
You might not rush to throw it out. It may sit there on a high shelf, waiting for a party or a batch of frozen snacks. Yet the center of gravity has shifted. The nine-mode cooker takes the prime spot near the outlet, next to the cutting board, always plugged in, always ready.
And your cooking changes too. You experiment with steaming vegetables you used to boil to death. You dare to try yogurt or proofing bread dough because the program is right there, blinking at you. You don’t become a chef overnight, but dinner starts to feel less like a daily battle and more like a short, manageable ritual.
At some point, the question is no longer “Is this better than my air fryer?” but “What kind of kitchen do I want to live in?” One crowded with single-purpose gadgets and tangled cables, or one where a small, slightly humming box quietly adapts to your cravings.
This device won’t fix a busy schedule or make vegetables chop themselves. It just gives you a more forgiving margin between “I don’t have time” and “I still want something that tastes like real food.”
Maybe that’s why so many people, after a few months with a nine-in-one cooker, look at their old air fryer, smile with a bit of nostalgia, and finally say it out loud: goodbye.
| Key point | Detail | Value for the reader |
|---|---|---|
| Multiple cooking methods in one | Air fry, roast, bake, steam, sauté, slow cook, grill, reheat, dehydrate/sous-vide | Replaces several appliances, frees counter space, cuts mental load |
| Step-by-step adoption | Start with 3 core modes, add more as they become routine | Makes the device less intimidating and easier to integrate into daily life |
| Shift in kitchen habits | From gadget clutter to a single versatile “cooking hub” | Smoother weeknight meals, more experimentation, less stress around cooking |
FAQ:
- Question 1Does a nine-in-one cooker really replace an air fryer?
- Question 2Can I cook complete meals in it, not just snacks?
- Question 3Is it complicated to clean compared with a classic air fryer?
- Question 4Will it actually save energy and money in the long run?
- Question 5What should I look for when choosing this kind of device?
Originally posted 2026-03-12 11:29:44.