Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer Review

The Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is a powerhouse kitchen appliance designed to make cooking faster, easier, and healthier. Known for its versatility, this air fryer offers a wide range of cooking functions, from air frying and baking to roasting and rotisserie cooking. With its large capacity, it’s perfect for families, meal prep enthusiasts, or anyone who enjoys cooking large portions at once. Featuring advanced technology, an intuitive user interface, and easy-to-clean components, this air fryer promises to simplify meal preparation while delivering delicious results. In this review, we’ll take a closer look at its design, performance, and features to help you determine if it’s the right fit for your kitchen. 

Design and Build Quality 

The Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer boasts a sleek and professional stainless-steel design, making it a great fit for modern kitchens. Its polished exterior is complemented by a sturdy build, promising durability and functionality. The overall look is elegant yet practical, with French-style double doors that add a touch of sophistication and convenience when accessing the interior.

The air fryer’s dimensions—15.8 inches wide, 14.8 inches tall, and 13.8 inches deep—make it spacious enough for large meals yet compact enough to fit on most countertops. The layout of the controls on the digital panel is intuitive, with clearly marked presets and a well-lit display. This ensures ease of use, even for those unfamiliar with multifunctional kitchen appliances.

Included accessories like the grill plate, crisper basket, bake pan, and rotisserie spit are thoughtfully designed, matching the high-quality finish of the main unit. These additions not only expand the air fryer’s versatility but also underline its robust construction. The accessories feel solid and well-made, enhancing the overall value of the product.

The build quality of the Emeril Lagasse air fryer feels premium like Ninja DZ550 Foodi Air Fryer. The stainless-steel body is resistant to fingerprints and smudges, maintaining its clean and polished appearance. The interior is spacious, with clearly labeled cooking levels that make it easy to follow recipes or experiment with custom settings.

Cooking Capacity

The Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer has an impressive capacity that caters to both families and individuals who enjoy cooking in larger batches. Its 26-quart interior is spacious enough to fit an entire chicken, making it ideal for preparing roasts or poultry dishes with ease. The design also accommodates a 12-inch pizza, making it suitable for pizza nights without needing a separate appliance. This large capacity is excellent for cooking multiple items at once, saving time and effort in the kitchen.

The air fryer’s interior can handle meal prepping or large portions for gatherings, reducing the need for multiple cooking cycles. Its generous size supports versatile functions like baking, roasting, or air frying, ensuring flexibility for various types of meals. The rotisserie feature works seamlessly with the large space, allowing you to prepare a perfectly cooked rotisserie chicken at home. While the capacity is highly versatile and practical, it might feel a bit oversized for smaller households or kitchens with limited counter space.

User Interface

The user interface of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is thoughtfully designed to make cooking as intuitive and convenient as possible. The digital control panel is located at the top front of the unit, making it easy to access and operate without bending or straining. It features a sleek, modern layout with clearly labeled buttons and a bright, easy-to-read display. This combination of design and functionality ensures that even first-time users can navigate it without confusion.

The air fryer comes with multiple one-touch presets for a wide variety of cooking modes, including air frying, toasting, baking, roasting, dehydrating, and even rotisserie cooking. These presets save time and effort by automatically adjusting the temperature and cooking time for specific foods, such as fries, steak, chicken, or pizza. The responsive buttons and rotary dial offer quick adjustments, allowing users to fine-tune settings to their liking like Toshiba 7.7QT Air Fryer.

The addition of indicator lights and audible alerts enhances the user experience, letting you know when the machine is preheated or when the cooking process is complete. The interface also displays essential information like the selected cooking mode, temperature, and remaining time, ensuring you always stay in control.

Versatility

The Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is an incredibly versatile appliance, designed to handle a wide range of cooking tasks with ease. Its functionality goes far beyond traditional air frying, offering multiple cooking modes that can replace several kitchen appliances. This makes it a true all-in-one solution for various cooking needs.

With its numerous presets, you can air fry, bake, roast, broil, dehydrate, toast, and even slow cook. The rotisserie function is particularly impressive, allowing you to prepare perfectly cooked chickens or roasts that rival those from professional kitchens. Its large interior space makes it suitable for cooking everything from a full chicken to side dishes like vegetables, as well as baked goods, pizzas, and even snacks like dehydrated fruits or beef jerky. The ability to combine functions, such as roasting and air frying, further highlights its versatility.

This appliance is perfect for families, meal preppers, or anyone who wants to experiment with different recipes. Whether you’re cooking breakfast, lunch, dinner, or dessert, the Emeril Lagasse air fryer can handle it all. It eliminates the need for separate gadgets like a toaster oven, rotisserie machine, or dehydrator, freeing up valuable counter and storage space.

However, while its versatility is impressive, users should note that mastering all the functions may take some time. The presets are helpful, but for more customized recipes, manual adjustments might require a bit of trial and error.

Frying Quality

The frying quality of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is one of its standout features, delivering crispy and delicious results with minimal oil. Using powerful convection heating and air circulation technology, it ensures even cooking, creating a golden, crunchy texture that rivals traditional deep frying. Foods like French fries, chicken wings, and onion rings come out crispy on the outside and tender on the inside, all while using up to 70-80% less oil than traditional frying methods.

The air fryer’s spacious design allows food to be spread out, ensuring consistent air circulation around every piece. This prevents sogginess or uneven cooking, common issues in smaller or lower-quality air fryers. The crisper basket, included as an accessory, plays a crucial role in achieving superior frying results, as it allows hot air to flow freely around the food.

One of its strengths is the ability to fry multiple servings at once, thanks to its large capacity. This makes it ideal for preparing meals for families or gatherings without needing multiple batches. Whether frying frozen foods or fresh ingredients, the results are consistently excellent, and the presets make it easy to get the right time and temperature for different dishes.

However, like most air fryers, achieving the same level of deep-fried richness might require slight adjustments, such as shaking or flipping the food midway through cooking. While it excels at creating a healthier alternative, some may find it doesn’t fully replicate the exact flavor of oil-fried foods.

The frying quality of this air fryer deserves a 92/100. Its ability to produce crispy, evenly cooked food with minimal oil is impressive, though it may fall slightly short for those seeking the exact richness of deep frying. Its performance is still exceptional for a healthier cooking option.

Food Making Time

The food-making time of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is impressively fast compared to conventional cooking methods. Thanks to its powerful convection technology, it cooks food more quickly and evenly by circulating hot air at high speeds. This reduces overall cooking times, especially for items that typically require longer preparation, such as roasting or baking.

For frying, foods like French fries, chicken wings, and onion rings take around 15–25 minutes, depending on portion size and desired crispiness. Frozen items cook even faster, often requiring no preheating and finishing in about 10–15 minutes. Baking and roasting, such as preparing a whole chicken or a pizza, are also efficient. A 4–5 pound rotisserie chicken takes approximately 50 minutes to an hour, while a 12-inch pizza can be ready in as little as 12–15 minutes. These times are significantly shorter compared to traditional ovens.

The appliance's one-touch presets further streamline the process by eliminating the guesswork of setting precise times and temperatures. Additionally, the lack of a long preheating phase saves time upfront, as the air fryer quickly reaches optimal cooking conditions. This makes it ideal for busy households or anyone looking to prepare meals quickly without compromising on quality.

However, some foods may require occasional flipping or shaking to ensure even results, which can add a bit of hands-on time. While it’s faster than traditional methods, cooking in larger batches or multi-level configurations might slightly extend the cooking duration to ensure even heat distribution.

The food-making time deserves a 94/100. It is highly efficient for most recipes, significantly reducing cooking times while maintaining great results. The slight deduction is for the minor effort required for flipping or ensuring even cooking in larger batches.

Temperature and Stability

The temperature control and stability of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer are top-notch, ensuring that your food is cooked consistently and evenly every time. The appliance uses advanced convection heating technology, which provides precise and reliable temperature settings across a wide range of cooking modes. From air frying to baking, roasting, and even dehydrating, the temperature control is designed to handle a variety of cooking tasks with ease.

The temperature can be easily adjusted between 90°F to 400°F, giving you full control over your cooking process. Whether you're slow cooking at a lower temperature for tender meats or using high heat to achieve a crispy exterior, the air fryer maintains a steady temperature throughout the cooking cycle. The precise control ensures that food doesn't burn or undercook, which is often a concern with less advanced models.

One of the key features is its stability, meaning that once the set temperature is reached, it stays consistent throughout the cooking process. This is important for dishes that require even cooking, like baking or roasting, where fluctuations in temperature can lead to uneven results. The air fryer’s ability to maintain a constant temperature throughout ensures that foods are evenly cooked on all sides, with no need for constant adjustments or monitoring.

Additionally, the preheating process is quick, and the unit comes with built-in features that alert you when the temperature is stable and when the cooking is finished. This consistency contributes to a hassle-free cooking experience, where you can trust the appliance to deliver excellent results without worrying about temperature fluctuations.

The temperature control and stability of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer earn a 88/100. Its ability to maintain consistent temperatures across a wide range of cooking modes, paired with quick and reliable heat adjustments, makes it a highly efficient and effective appliance. The only minor downside is that it could occasionally take a bit longer to reach the desired temperature during some cooking modes, but this is a minor issue in the context of its overall performance.

Preheat

The preheat function of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is efficient and helps streamline the cooking process. One of the key advantages of this air fryer is that it doesn’t require a long preheating time, unlike traditional ovens. The appliance quickly heats up to the desired temperature, typically within a few minutes. This is particularly useful for people with busy schedules, as it saves valuable time during meal preparation.

The preheat time is generally short, ranging from 3 to 5 minutes, depending on the cooking temperature you’ve selected. This quick preheating ensures that your food starts cooking immediately once placed inside, preventing unnecessary delays and making the overall cooking process faster. For example, when air frying foods like French fries or chicken wings, the air fryer is ready in just a few minutes, allowing you to start cooking right away.

Unlike some air fryers that need to be preheated before each use, this model is designed to handle most tasks without extensive preheating. However, certain functions, like baking or roasting larger items, might benefit from a brief preheat, but it’s still much faster than traditional ovens. The unit has an indicator light or sound to let you know when it's preheated and ready for cooking, making it very user-friendly.

While preheating is generally quick, it’s important to note that if you're cooking multiple items or large batches, you may notice a slight increase in preheating time. But overall, the speed and efficiency of the preheating process enhance the convenience of this air fryer.

The preheat function of the Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Air Fryer earns an 88/100. The preheating is quick and efficient for most cooking tasks, contributing to faster meal preparation. A small deduction comes from the occasional need for slightly longer preheating times for larger items, but overall, it is an excellent feature.

Easy to Clean

The Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer is designed with convenience in mind, and cleaning it is relatively easy compared to many other kitchen appliances. The interior and exterior are built from durable, non-stick materials that help prevent food from sticking, making post-cooking cleanup much simpler. This feature ensures that food residue and grease don't cling to the surfaces, reducing the time and effort needed to clean.

The removable parts, including the crisper basket, drip tray, and grill racks, are dishwasher safe. This means you can simply place them in the dishwasher for a hassle-free clean. If you prefer to hand wash, the components are easy to wipe down with warm soapy water, and the non-stick surfaces prevent stubborn food particles from sticking. The large size of the air fryer may mean it requires some extra attention when cleaning the interior, but overall, it’s easy to wipe down the walls and base after each use.

The exterior of the air fryer is made of stainless steel, which not only adds to its aesthetic appeal but also makes it resistant to stains and smudges. A simple wipe with a soft cloth is usually sufficient to keep it looking shiny and clean. However, because of its size, cleaning the exterior might require a bit more effort than smaller models, especially after cooking greasy foods.

One of the most convenient features is the absence of any major nooks or crannies where food can get trapped, making it easier to maintain the appliance’s cleanliness. There’s also no need to worry about excessive oil buildup, as the air fryer uses little to no oil in cooking.

The ease of cleaning for the Emeril Extra Large Air Fryer deserves a 90/100. It’s simple to clean, with dishwasher-safe parts and non-stick surfaces that help prevent food from sticking. A slight deduction comes from the larger size, which may require a bit more effort to clean thoroughly, especially the exterior. However, overall, it’s a user-friendly and low-maintenance appliance.

Final  Verdict

The Emeril Lagasse 26 QT Extra Large Air Fryer truly stands out as a versatile, efficient, and well-designed appliance. Its spacious 26-quart capacity makes it ideal for larger families or anyone who enjoys cooking in bulk, while its multiple cooking functions offer a wide range of possibilities, from air frying to baking and even rotisserie cooking. The air fryer delivers excellent frying quality, producing crispy, evenly cooked food with minimal oil, which is perfect for those looking to enjoy healthier meals without compromising on taste.

Its user-friendly interface, with easy-to-read controls and one-touch presets, makes cooking a breeze, even for beginners. The appliance also excels in temperature control and stability, ensuring that your food is cooked to perfection every time. Preheating is quick, and the overall food-making time is fast, helping you get meals on the table in no time. Additionally, the easy-to-clean design, with dishwasher-safe components and non-stick surfaces, ensures that maintaining the air fryer is hassle-free.

While it might be a bit too large for small kitchens or households, its size and features make it an excellent choice for those who need an all-in-one appliance that can handle a variety of cooking tasks. Its ability to replace multiple kitchen gadgets, like a toaster oven, rotisserie, or dehydrator, makes it an incredibly valuable addition to any kitchen.