Best Prices Today: Cosori TurboBlaze Air Fryer

$99.97

If you’re buying an air fryer, it’s tempting to choose one of the best known brands. However, Cosori’s 6QT/6L Turbo Blaze Air Fryer is a good reason to step out of your comfort zone. Cosori – an acronym of Cooking, Smarter, with Originality and Inspiration – might only be a young brand, established in 2017, while the boast on the Turbo Blaze Air Fryer’s box, that it’s a ‘woman-founded company’ [sic], is awkwardly expressed.

But this air fryer offers a lot: as well as programmes for proving dough or making yogurt, warming food and dehydrating it, there are four Turbo modes with a fast fan for speedy air frying, cooking from frozen, roasting and grilling, and some novelties, including up to 24 hours of operation, and being able to swap Celsius for Fahrenheit.

Design & Build

• Touchscreen controls
• Minimalist design
• Annoying button press drawer release

Short and squat – it’s a mere 11.8in/30.1cm tall with the same width and 15.7in/40cm deep – so that it can maximise the cooking area inside, Cosori’s 6QT/6L Turbo Blaze Air Fryer manages to be sleeker than most. The front is devoid of any buttons, allowing the matt black exterior to sit unobtrusively in your kitchen. This is paired with a graphite grey trim on the handle of the drawer and upper edge. There’s a button to release the drawer and inside, a non-stick aluminium crisper plate complete with silicone stoppers so that it stays put. Both are dishwasher safe.

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

While it’s a relatively compact appliance, it’ll need 5in/13cm clearance at the back and the same above when in use. This means that you might be able to store it at the back of a worktop but if there are wall units or shelving above, you might not be able to run it there. Fortunately, while it weighs 13.2lbs/6kg, it doesn’t feel especially heavy to move around.

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

On top is where you’ll find the touchscreen controls for its nine functions and toggling time and temperature: unlike some, each button is still visible when the machine is off. Turned on, the LED display in the centre comes to life, showing cooking status, fan speed and selected time and temperature. It’s clear and easy to read, although we found that bright light made this more difficult. Also included is a useful recipe booklet and plenty of guidance.

Performance & Features

• Wide temperature range
• Food crowding can lead to uneven results
• Reheat and keep warm functions

The highlight of Cosori’s 6QT/6L Turbo Blaze Air Fryer is its 1750W of power and the varied functions this enables: rather than being tailored to different foods, they’re cooking methods. There are four that are Turbo – fast fan speeds – dealing with air frying, cooking from frozen, grilling and roasting, alongside slower fanned heat: preheat, reheat, dry, bake, proof and warm.

This means you can easily switch from air frying dinner, to making a batch of yogurt or dried fruit overnight, ready for tomorrow’s breakfast, for example. And while there’s no manual mode, each of these functions can be adapted to suit what’s being cooked, with a range of 15 minutes to 24 hours for the lower temperature programmes (which can reduce to 90°F/30°C), and up to an hour for the higher temperature ones (with a top temperature of 450°F/230°C).

Unlike some air fryers, there’s less emphasis on shaking food for even results, and more on its wide, deep crisper plate and drawer allowing hot air to circulate efficiently. However, this means that you won’t always be able to use the drawer’s whole capacity. For example, its recipe booklet suggests making 700g of chips at a time, with a higher temperature (420°F/215°C) but shorter air frying duration than most (14 minutes).

We used this setting to cook a batch of fresh chipped potato, tossed in a small amount of oil, plus a suggested preheat of four minutes. Having a dedicated button to preheat was especially useful. After cooking time had elapsed, we found there were several pale pieces remaining, so added on three minutes more. This produced more consistent results, with most of the chips golden and crisp at the ends.

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Cooking food from frozen was more straightforward. There was no guidance for hash browns but the default time for the frozen programme was 14 minutes at 390°F/200°C. We raised it to 400°F/205°C in line with guidance for croquettes. This was sufficient for the hash browns, which emerged perfectly cooked on both sides without the need to be turned over halfway through. A plus of this air fryer is that time and temperature can be toggled while it’s in use, so if a setting proves to be too hot or short, it’s an easy solve.

There’s just enough space inside for a small chicken, but realistically, it’s more suited to cooking sections of poultry. We roasted four legs, which was a snug fit, on the roast setting (a default of 430°F/220°C for 12 minutes), increasing the time to 20 minutes plus a preheat. The chicken was thoroughly cooked through with golden brown skin and very moist. However the grease from the legs left smears above the drawer, despite the matt finish of the exterior.

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

One issue we experienced while testing was the awkwardness of the button on the handle. If you’re used to using an air fryer without it, it’s easy to forget to press it to unlock the drawer and end up yanking the appliance towards you instead. It’s also prone to needing a firm shove to close the drawer properly and lock it in place.

There was a lot that we did like though: it was easy to change time and temperature both gradually and more quickly, you can save different function presets if you always use a longer time or different temperature, and it was useful to have both a reheat (for leftovers), and keep warm (so different parts of a meal can be served hot together).

Price & Availability

The TurboBlaze is a better buy in the US with an MSRP of $119.99. You can pick it up at this price direct from Cosori, but at the time of writing, you can buy it on offer from Amazon for $99.97.

In the UK, the TurboBlaze is priced at £159.99, which isn’t quite as competitive. It’s currently out of stock at Cosori, but once again it’s on sale at Amazon, where you can get it for £109.99. We think it’s a very good deal at this price.

If this isn’t the right air fryer for you, have a look at our round-up of the best air fryers, and if you’re looking for a larger, more versatile cooker, check out the best air fryer ovens we’ve tested.

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Rachel Ogden / Foundry

Should you buy the Cosori TurboBlaze air fryer?

While some air fryers are more suited to busy families or those who cook from scratch, Cosori’s 6L Turbo Blaze Air Fryer, with its versatility and presets, manages to tick both boxes, which is no mean feat. It’s equally good for those who rely on dinner from the freezer or the fridge.

And while space inside it is more limited than that offered by larger models, there’s little that would improve it, other than removing the annoying button on the handle. Ultimately, if what’s been deterring you from buying an air fryer is the feeling that you may not use it much, the Cosori’s 6L Turbo Blaze Air Fryer could be the appliance to convert you.