I finally got around to trying a whole, roasted chicken in my Power XL 7 qt. air fryer and loved the results. Haven’t tried it on the Air Fryer setting on my new wall oven though. I’m sure it will do as well cooking it in the oven as well. The meat of the nearly 5# bird is moist and cooked perfectly (even at the joints). My husband just loves chicken that is baked or roasted, so he was a fan for certain! Also tried my new Peggy’s Poultry Rub on it and that was delicious! I may add even more of the rub next time! Yummy! This recipe is suitable for all phases of Atkins and other keto diets, as well as for Paleo-Primal folks.
INGREDIENTS:
1 whole chicken (mine was 4.75 lbs)
1 t. olive oil
1 T. Peggy’s Poultry Rub (or seasoning of your choice)
DIRECTIONS: Pat the chicken dry of any water/moisture with paper towels. Rub olive oil all over the chicken getting all skin surfaces damp with oil. You’ll want to wash and dry off your hands at this point. Next sprinkle 1 tsp. of the seasoning bland over the top surfaces of the chicken. Sprinkle 1 tsp. over the bottom surfaces of the chicken. Invert chicken to expose the carcass opening and sprinkle the remaining spice blend as best you can inside, rubbing until it is distributed. Although I did not do it this, next time I may make a slit into the lower leg quarter joints and rub a tad in that joint as well as a tad underneath the breast skin as I am able.
Preheat your air-fryer at 350º a few minutes (mine requires 4 min. preheat). Open basket/drawer and place seasoned bird into the basket/drawer breast side down. Cook the bird for 30 minutes. Then open drawer and using a heavy kitchen fork, turn the bird over, now breast up. Cook for 20 minutes and open basket to (check leg quarter with a meat thermometer (165º internal is done). Also check thickest part of breast. If not to 165º yet, continue cooking another 5-10 minutes and check again. My 4.75# bird took precisely 25 minutes on side two. Cookers vary, so the rule of thumb with air fryers is CHECK YOUR FOOD OFTEN to avoid under cooking, or worse, over cooking and major disappointment. Always remember that any air-fryer recipe is just a guideline and nothing more. Cookers vary for any recipe cookbook for them to be always spot on……….even the manufacturer’s cookbook! Food size and volume/weight impact any instructions and cooking times/temps.
ADDED NOTE: I recommend soaking your basket in 1″ water while you enjoy your meal (for easier cleanup). Also don’t forget when fully cooled, to wipe off (use a soapy sponge) the element at the top and back walls of cooker to get any grease splatters there. If you don’t do that, the cooker is likely to smoke heavily at next use and you’ll think the machine is dying on you. It just wasn’t thoroughly cleaned after roasting meat.
NUTRITIONAL INFO: I can’t really provide that for you as I can’t know what pieces you eat, how large your bird is, nor how many pieces you will eat. I certainly can’t know how much of the seasoning you will be ingesting on any particular piece. Best calculation I can recommend for you is to take the stats for the piece/size of piece(s) of chicken you eat and add 1/8 tsp. of the spice blend for each piece you consume. That said, this recipe is so low-carb…………I wouldn’t bother calculating anything but the meat itself that you consume. One can get too anal about any diet in my opinion. Just enjoy this delicious recipe and know that you are not breaking the carb bank doing so!
1 tsp. spice blend = 0.84g NET CARBS
Buttoni's Low-Carb Recipes 
Loved the air fryer whole chicken. Could you please share recipes for air frying? I love your posts……and trust your information. Thank you.
On Sun, Aug 9, 2020, 12:14 PM Buttoni’s Low-Carb Recipes wrote:
> Peggy posted: ” I finally got around to trying a whole, roasted chicken in > my Power XL 7 qt. air fryer last night. The meat of the nearly 5# bird > moist, cooked perfectly done (even at the joints). My husband just loves > chicken that is baked or roasted! Also tried ” >
I’m more of a traditional cook and don’t use it all that much just yet. I tend to grab traditional baking pans simply out of habit (I’m 71 and have always been a creature of habit). But I have posted the few things I’ve tried in my fryer. I will always affix the words AIR FRYER at the front of the recipe names, so if you type that into the search box, only those recipes will come up in search results. There are also some great air fryer recipes to be had on Facebook. Check out these groups: One Air Fryer, Air Fryer Tips and Recipes, and Fork to Spoon are very helpful. I used them a lot when I first bought my fryer for cooking time/temp “guidelines”.
Rub sounds great…I will try it tomorrow. Do you like the air fry…I’m thinking of buying one but don’t know which one to buy.
Thanks for all your hard and good work!
I like it for SOME things, Linda. But I honestly don’t use mine all that often, maybe once a week, because I basically have cooked too many years conventionally to see that many advantages. I can bake off tater tots just as easily/fast in my oven. I can roast meats in my oven (which can go convection) just as easily. And I personally find cleaning off grease from a baking pan much simpler than washing up a special appliance you can’t submerge in water. Plus I don’t like storage issues with specialized appliances. But again, I’m 71 and a creature of years of habit. Younger cooks seem to really like them a lot. JMHO. That said, if I were buying one myself (mine basket one was a gift), I would go for the square, oven-type, the largest one I could afford, and that would probably be (my current thinking after much researching) the Instant Pot OMNI, based on reviews by people who use them more extensively than I do. My second choice would likely be be Emeril’s 360 Air Fryer because it has so many internal fans for best hot air circulation and more even cooking. The basket style cook efficiently, but a little hot at the top where the element is when doing say a whole roasted chicken or very large chunk of meat that get close to that element. You just have to watch and check often in those cases to avoid over browning and cooking.