Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer SL400UK Review: Max capacity, minimum size

Verdict

Stacking its dual drawers on top of each other, the Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer SL400UK offers a staggering 9.5 litres of cooking space squeezed into a device that only takes up the same counter space as a singe-zone air fryer. New to this model is dual-layer cooking, so you can cook four different things at once, with the slight caveat that it can be fiddly to turn food during cooking. That minor issue aside, brilliant results and intuitive controls make this my favourite dual-basket air fryer.

Black Friday Special – SL400UKDBCP

For Black Friday, Ninja has introduced a special edition of the product, the Ninja Deluxe Black & Copper Double Stack XL 2-Drawer Air Fryer 9.5L SL400UKDBCP. The functionality and features are the same as for the product below, so you can read this review to see if the special edition is right for you.

The differences are down to colour and accessories. The Black Friday special is black and copper, with copper-colour handles and control dial. It looks quite flash, without being over the top, and makes a change from the standard monotone colouring of the regular model.

Ninja is also bundling a set of silicone tongs and an apron, alongside everything else that you get from the standard edition. The standard model remains a brilliant choice, but at £219 for the SL400UKDBCP, it’s even better. This version has limited stock, and you can buy directly from ninjakitchen.co.uk.

Introduction

I love the convenience of a double-drawer air fryer, but the counter space they take up makes them a no-go for many people. With the Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer SL400UK, you get two drawers, one stacked on top of the other, so the air fryer only takes up the same footprint as a single-drawer model.

With two-layer cooking added into the mix, high temperature cooking and excellent results across the board, this is the best dual-drawer air fryer yet.

Design and features

• Vertical arrangement saves on counter space
• Dual-layer cooking
• Max Crisp mode

The Ninja Foodi MAX Dual Zone Air Fryer AF400UK showed the power of dual-drawer air fryers, but it’s one heck of a beast, taking up a lot of counter space. With the Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer SL400UK, you get the same 9.5-litre capacity (4.75-litres per drawer), with the unit taking up just over half the counter space by comparison.

Impressively, although the Double Stack is taller than the AF400UK, it’s only taller by 6cm, so doesn’t look dominating.

Stacking the drawers vertically, Ninja has had to redesign the system’s workings. Rather than having the heating element and fan at the top of the drawers, as with the AF400UK, they have been relocated to the back of the unit, blowing through the vents in the back of the drawers.

That redesign has one additional benefit: each drawer can cook on two layers with the provided wire racks. For multi-layer cooking, the Double Stack Pro button needs to be hit, and anything on the wire rack needs to be large enough not to fall through the gap.

That aside, two-layer cooking lets you double up on capacity, or even cook an entire meal in just a single drawer.

There are a couple of drawbacks to this cooking system. First, two-layer cooking works best if your layers cook at the same temperature for the same amount of time; if you’ve got a mismatch, as I had, then you’ll need to add one layer part-way through the cook.

Secondly, turning food becomes much harder. While the wire racks have handles, so you can lift them out with oven gloves, doing so while they’re loaded with food isn’t always practical.

That’s not to say that I don’t appreciate the dual-layer cooking; it’s just that the mode needs to be used with full awareness of its caveats to get the best results.

Without the wire racks, each drawer features a standard 4.75-litre capacity, with a crisper plate at the bottom. A handle on the front makes it easy to remove a drawer and shake food to help it cook evenly.

Ninja has once again demonstrated that it’s the master of interface. Rather than having a complex array of modes designed for specific foods, such as chips and chicken, the controls consist of the mode (Air Fry, Roast, Max Crisp, Reheat, Bake and Dehydrate), temperature and time. Max Crisp doesn’t have temperature selection and runs at 240°C, with just the time selectable; it’s designed for foods that need a really crispy finish such as hash browns.

Ninja provides a useful booklet with suggested modes, temperatures and cooking times for most common foods, which makes life easier. Overall, the Double Stack is lightning-quick to use.

Drawers can be used individually, effectively giving you two separate air fryers. However, the drawers can be used together. Match mode sets both drawers to the same settings which is useful when you want to double up on the same ingredients.

Sync mode lets you cook on different settings, but the drawers are automatically timed to finish simultaneously. The Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer SL400UK is designed in such a way that achieving what you want is easy.

Drawers and accessories are dishwasher safe, although they’re almost as quick and easy to wash by hand.

Performance

• Very crispy results
• Two-layer cooking is effective
• Excellent cooking

I started by cooking a batch of oven chips along with some fish fingers, using the two-layer cooking mode. As the fish fingers require less cooking time than the chips, I added these a few minutes into the cooking process.

At the end of cooking, my chips were perfectly and evenly cooked, and the fish fingers had a nice crisp finish to them. You can’t do better than that, and being able to use one drawer for a complete meal is brilliant.

Next, I used the Max Crisp mode for hash browns, cooking them from frozen in just 12 minutes. The results are incredible, with a super-crispy exterior and a fluffy interior that rival air fryers can’t match.

I also cooked an entire chicken on the roast setting. Fitting a chicken into a drawer means I could cook an entire family-sized meal in just one air fryer.

Cooking in just an hour, I used a temperature probe to make sure that the chicken was cooked through (it was). I was impressed with the results: the skin was very crispy while the chicken remained moist inside.

I used the dehydrate mode on apple slices, to remove the moisture content. They make a neat snack that will last longer than fresh slices. I also find dehydrate a useful option for garden herbs.

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