Chunky homemade chips in an air fryer
Fresh — the short answer
200°C (392°F) for 20–24 min
- For
- 1000g in total
- In
- Multicooker with air fry
- Published for
- Ninja Foodi MAX Health Grill & Air Fryer AG551UK
- Preheat
- Yes, before the food goes in
- Part way
- shake the food at about 10 min
- Check
- A crisp shell over a floury centre
Twenty to twenty-four minutes at 200°C, and thirty minutes of soaking beforehand.
Fresh
The quick answer
200°C (392°F) for 20–24 min
Published range for a kilogram of thick hand-cut fries.
- Assuming
- 1000g in total
- In
- Multicooker with air fry
- Published for
- Ninja Foodi MAX Health Grill & Air Fryer AG551UK
- Preheat
- Yes, before the food goes in
- Result
- Crisp outside, moist inside
Preparation
Hand-cut thick, soaked in cold water for at least thirty minutes and patted dry, then tossed in half a tablespoon to three tablespoons of vegetable oil, as the row and its footnote print. The oil is a band and is not recorded as one amount.
While it cooks
At about 10–12 minutes: Shake the food
The chart tells the owner to shake or toss the food often and to check it frequently. It prints that beside the whole chart, not against this row, and gives no single point for it.
How to tell it is done
- A crisp shell over a floury centre
- Golden rather than brown
Where these figures came from — fresh
- Applies to
- Specific to this model
- Why this rating
- A published row from the manufacturer's own guide for this appliance, held as the chart prints it: its amount, its preparation and its oil where it gives them, and nothing where it does not. Quantity is what makes a chart row checkable against the food in front of a reader, and this chart states one for almost every row.
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-13
What this does not cover
- Published by the manufacturer for this appliance. It is evidence about this machine and is not general advice.
- This is a lidded cooking pot rather than a shallow drawer. Depth affects how much fits in one layer, and the quantity in the chart assumes the crisper basket.
- The chart's preparation column says hand-cut, and its footnote to this row speaks of cutting the potatoes and soaking the raw fries. It is held as fresh on those words, which are the chart's and not AirfryerHQ's.
Sources (1)
Ninja Foodi MAX Health Grill & Air Fryer AG551UK — Inspiration Guide and cooking charts (PDF)
SharkNinja Europe Limited — Manufacturer cooking chart (United Kingdom)
Relied on for: The temperature, time and quantity for chunky homemade chips.
States this directly
Passage read and verified
Retrieved 2026-08-13 from argos-support.co.uk
Retrieved from Argos's manual library for Argos product 735/0124, published alongside the instruction booklet as a second document.
Chilled
Cooked as fresh: use the fresh figures above. Raw food sold chilled is the fresh state under another name, and the charts those figures come from start from fridge-cold.
What usually goes wrong
Chips that stick to each other and to the basket, and never crisp. Surface starch is the cause of all three, which is what the soaking instruction is for — and drying afterwards matters as much as the soak, because a wet chip steams.
Running the appliance safely
The rules for the machine are the same whatever is in it: plug it straight into a wall socket, leave clear space round it, do not overfill it, do not leave it running unattended, and unplug it at black smoke or an electrical smell. They are set out once, each with its source and what to do if it has already happened, and not repeated on every food. Every rule for running an air fryer safely.
One of them is about this food and not the machine: Aim for a golden yellow colour or lighter on starchy foods such as chips and roast potatoes, rather than a darker brown.
Potato in fast-moving hot air
A potato is mostly water held in a starch matrix. Heat gelatinises the starch and drives water out of the surface layer; when that dehydrated layer is thin, dry and hot enough it becomes crisp. The whole game is getting water away from the surface faster than it arrives from inside, which is why crowding a basket produces soggy chips — the escaping steam has nowhere to go and condenses back onto the food. Sugar content decides browning speed, which is why some potatoes darken far faster than others at the same setting.
Where to go from here
The pages that answer the questions this one tends to raise.
- How food actually gets crispyWhy patting it dry, spacing it out and a little oil are all the same instruction — so you can apply it when a page runs out.
- Why published timings differIf another chart says something else, this is usually why — and which one to believe.
Easily confused with
- Homemade chips — A different cooking problem with a different answer.
- Potato wedges — A different cooking problem with a different answer.