1 00:00:02,000 --> 00:00:04,720 Take one. 2 00:00:04,720 --> 00:00:05,840 Shall we? 3 00:00:05,840 --> 00:00:08,200 Take a minute. 4 00:00:08,200 --> 00:00:09,640 Look around you. 5 00:00:11,080 --> 00:00:12,880 You probably never think about it, 6 00:00:12,880 --> 00:00:16,520 but we are living in a time of incredible ingenuity. 7 00:00:16,520 --> 00:00:20,080 Our lives are filled with fiendishly clever bits of tech 8 00:00:20,080 --> 00:00:23,200 that basically make the modern world tick. 9 00:00:24,240 --> 00:00:28,960 The problem is, we're now so used to these devices 10 00:00:28,960 --> 00:00:32,680 that we have forgotten to remember how clever they are. 11 00:00:32,680 --> 00:00:35,440 ROBOTIC VOICE: I don't have an answer for that. 12 00:00:35,440 --> 00:00:38,000 I'm Professor Hannah Fry, 13 00:00:38,000 --> 00:00:43,320 your hammer-wielding tech curious tour guide... 14 00:00:43,320 --> 00:00:44,840 Woo! 15 00:00:44,840 --> 00:00:47,800 ..to the secret genius of everyday objects. 16 00:00:47,800 --> 00:00:50,400 There is one law of physics that you need to know. 17 00:00:50,400 --> 00:00:52,720 In each episode... 18 00:00:52,720 --> 00:00:54,000 Whoa! 19 00:00:54,000 --> 00:00:57,360 ..I will take one seemingly ordinary item... 20 00:00:58,760 --> 00:01:01,360 Woo! Immediately smoking. 21 00:01:01,360 --> 00:01:03,840 ..and I'll look at it in frankly... 22 00:01:03,840 --> 00:01:05,520 Yeah! 23 00:01:05,520 --> 00:01:07,320 ..obscene detail... 24 00:01:07,320 --> 00:01:09,200 Two googly eyes. 25 00:01:09,200 --> 00:01:12,040 It has 180 degree view. 26 00:01:12,040 --> 00:01:15,560 ..meet the people who helped make it... 27 00:01:15,560 --> 00:01:18,000 This is the very first air fryer. 28 00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:21,880 ..and follow the twisty-turny journey through the history 29 00:01:21,880 --> 00:01:23,200 of its invention. 30 00:01:23,200 --> 00:01:27,120 BBC VOICE: If you overshoot the turning point, don't try to do this. 31 00:01:27,120 --> 00:01:30,080 It's wobbly, Johnny! Yeah, it's just wind. 32 00:01:34,560 --> 00:01:37,560 This time, it's the air fryer. 33 00:01:37,560 --> 00:01:41,120 I'm Hannah Fry, right? I was literally born to do this. 34 00:01:41,120 --> 00:01:43,640 OK, confession time. 35 00:01:43,640 --> 00:01:48,160 I resisted the first several waves of air fryer craze, 36 00:01:48,160 --> 00:01:49,640 but I finally relented. 37 00:01:49,640 --> 00:01:52,640 And now that I own one, it sort of has grown on me. 38 00:01:52,640 --> 00:01:57,160 I do actually cook with it pretty much all the time. 39 00:01:57,160 --> 00:02:01,320 I don't think anybody expected this new device to come along 40 00:02:01,320 --> 00:02:05,440 and completely revolutionise the way that we prepare food. 41 00:02:07,320 --> 00:02:12,440 So how did the accidental creation of a wonder wire in the 1900s... 42 00:02:12,440 --> 00:02:14,960 Ooh, look at that little flame. 43 00:02:14,960 --> 00:02:18,640 ..a Navy officer's fight for a hot dinner in the '40s... 44 00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:22,000 You made an oven! 45 00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:26,080 ..and an inventor with a packet of fags in the '00s... 46 00:02:26,080 --> 00:02:29,040 And we all started blowing the smoke up the machine 47 00:02:29,040 --> 00:02:31,160 to see where the smoke went. 48 00:02:31,160 --> 00:02:36,360 ..all lead to this modern marvel that's taken over our kitchens? 49 00:02:36,360 --> 00:02:37,720 Ooh! 50 00:02:37,720 --> 00:02:39,040 Burnt cheese. 51 00:02:47,200 --> 00:02:51,160 15 years ago, air fryers didn't even exist. 52 00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:55,720 Ever feel your old range is ready to fall apart? 53 00:02:55,720 --> 00:03:00,440 If so, it couldn't happen at a better time than right now. 54 00:03:00,440 --> 00:03:04,880 And yet today, they're in one in three of our kitchens. 55 00:03:04,880 --> 00:03:07,640 200. 56 00:03:07,640 --> 00:03:10,720 From Ninjas to Tefals to Towers, 57 00:03:10,720 --> 00:03:13,360 we've all gone a bit nuts for these little ovens. 58 00:03:20,080 --> 00:03:23,640 I'm in the Netherlands to go behind the scenes at Versuni, 59 00:03:23,640 --> 00:03:26,720 makers of Phillips air fryers. 60 00:03:26,720 --> 00:03:28,920 They launched the world's first air fryer 61 00:03:28,920 --> 00:03:32,200 back in the cookery dark ages of 2010. 62 00:03:34,720 --> 00:03:36,760 Sorry, are you torturing chips? 63 00:03:36,760 --> 00:03:39,960 In their Innovation and Development Centre, 64 00:03:39,960 --> 00:03:43,000 food is scanned, sliced, and stabbed. 65 00:03:43,000 --> 00:03:44,880 How many broccoli do you reckon you've scanned? 66 00:03:44,880 --> 00:03:46,440 An embarrassing amount. 67 00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:51,920 By analysing every conceivable aspect of food, 68 00:03:51,920 --> 00:03:55,200 the team here is constantly improving the way their air fryers 69 00:03:55,200 --> 00:03:57,640 cook and crisp. 70 00:03:57,640 --> 00:04:01,000 We have two cameras here, so we take pictures 71 00:04:01,000 --> 00:04:05,360 and we predict how well cooked these fries are. 72 00:04:05,360 --> 00:04:07,920 It's no wonder there's so much tech tinkering. 73 00:04:07,920 --> 00:04:09,840 Given the appetite for these clever cookers, 74 00:04:09,840 --> 00:04:13,080 the air fryer market recently hit $1 billion. 75 00:04:14,880 --> 00:04:17,720 I had no idea that there was a place in the world where people cared 76 00:04:17,720 --> 00:04:19,720 about cooked fries this much. 77 00:04:23,920 --> 00:04:27,560 But how do these machines actually work? 78 00:04:27,560 --> 00:04:31,640 We're going to take apart the air fryer and look at everything 79 00:04:31,640 --> 00:04:36,280 from the heating element to the slippery non-stick coating. 80 00:04:36,280 --> 00:04:40,040 But we're starting with the whirling wheel that blasts air, 81 00:04:40,040 --> 00:04:44,720 crisps your chips, and browns your baked goods - it's the fan. 82 00:04:48,040 --> 00:04:51,400 Do you love fans? I'm absolutely a fan of fans. 83 00:04:52,840 --> 00:04:55,080 That is Emiel Koopmans, 84 00:04:55,080 --> 00:04:59,640 fluid dynamics guru and generally just the man with a fan plan. 85 00:05:01,000 --> 00:05:05,320 And our air fryer fan is quite the speed demon. 86 00:05:05,320 --> 00:05:09,800 So in this air fryer, we have a flow rate of about 40 to 60 litres 87 00:05:09,800 --> 00:05:13,680 per second. That is 40 to 60 bottles of milk 88 00:05:13,680 --> 00:05:17,560 going around the appliance every second. 89 00:05:17,560 --> 00:05:20,680 So you need quite some force to do that. 90 00:05:20,680 --> 00:05:22,880 And with this rotation, 91 00:05:22,880 --> 00:05:27,360 the tip of the fan is rotating about 80km per hour. 92 00:05:27,360 --> 00:05:29,640 OK, so you've got 60 litres of milk being chucked at it, 93 00:05:29,640 --> 00:05:31,880 about the same speed as you would do on the motorway. 94 00:05:31,880 --> 00:05:34,600 Exactly. Amazing! 95 00:05:34,600 --> 00:05:38,840 This is the best description of cooking I've ever heard. 96 00:05:38,840 --> 00:05:42,800 But the secret to the air fryer's fantastic success 97 00:05:42,800 --> 00:05:46,440 isn't just about creating a load of hot air. 98 00:05:46,440 --> 00:05:49,560 It's not about just adding a fan and you're done, 99 00:05:49,560 --> 00:05:53,480 but also on how the air flow is really inside the appliance 100 00:05:53,480 --> 00:05:56,560 and how we push the air through the food. 101 00:05:56,560 --> 00:06:00,600 And the way to achieve this is a quirky design feature. 102 00:06:00,600 --> 00:06:03,240 So this is our Starfish technology. 103 00:06:04,560 --> 00:06:08,080 Oh, hang on. I mean, I'm no marine biologist, but... 104 00:06:08,080 --> 00:06:10,000 Starfish have five arms. 105 00:06:11,720 --> 00:06:13,240 This one's only got four. 106 00:06:13,240 --> 00:06:17,440 Yeah, I'm not one would have thought of naming it. 107 00:06:17,440 --> 00:06:21,040 It may not be anatomically correct, but apparently, 108 00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:23,800 it is aerodynamically sound. 109 00:06:23,800 --> 00:06:27,920 This is very effectively pushing the air through the food. 110 00:06:27,920 --> 00:06:30,840 It makes sure that it's evenly distributed. 111 00:06:30,840 --> 00:06:35,200 This moulded metal design redirects the air being blasted down 112 00:06:35,200 --> 00:06:36,320 from the fan. 113 00:06:36,320 --> 00:06:39,680 The air's coming down here, and then you're, like, coaxing it, 114 00:06:39,680 --> 00:06:42,440 saying, "This way, guys, come this way, come this way." Yes. 115 00:06:42,440 --> 00:06:47,640 It's also generating a kind of tornado inside your air fryer. 116 00:06:48,920 --> 00:06:53,080 Of course, it's tricky to see that invisible air tornado, 117 00:06:53,080 --> 00:06:57,800 but I'm sure Emiel has a super scientific demo up his sleeve. 118 00:06:57,800 --> 00:07:01,600 So I have stars here, and I have two air fryers... Lovely. 119 00:07:01,600 --> 00:07:06,400 ..one with a flat bottom and one with a starfish. Mm-hm. 120 00:07:06,400 --> 00:07:09,960 I will turn on the one without the starfish. Mm-hm. 121 00:07:13,200 --> 00:07:14,960 Glitter tornado! 122 00:07:14,960 --> 00:07:19,440 We still have a glitter tornado, but the stars remain at the bottom. 123 00:07:19,440 --> 00:07:23,440 Yeah. I mean, it's not coming up the sides at all, is it? No. 124 00:07:23,440 --> 00:07:27,120 Let's try that again on the machine with a starfish inside. 125 00:07:28,960 --> 00:07:31,120 Oh, that IS different! 126 00:07:31,120 --> 00:07:33,560 And you can literally see it happening there. 127 00:07:33,560 --> 00:07:36,360 You can literally see them getting pushed up and then spun. 128 00:07:38,560 --> 00:07:42,040 The arms of the starfish act like ramps, pushing 129 00:07:42,040 --> 00:07:47,040 the hot air through and around the food and the chamber. 130 00:07:47,040 --> 00:07:50,640 Would you actually notice a difference if you were cooking? 131 00:07:50,640 --> 00:07:52,520 Yes, you would. 132 00:07:52,520 --> 00:07:56,240 If you do not have that starfish, then parts will be burnt, 133 00:07:56,240 --> 00:07:59,040 possibly, and parts will be raw. 134 00:08:01,120 --> 00:08:03,840 Many makes of air fryer will have their own 135 00:08:03,840 --> 00:08:08,160 clever flow features, all driven by a powerful fan, 136 00:08:08,160 --> 00:08:13,120 but how can blowing air create crispy fried food? 137 00:08:13,120 --> 00:08:15,120 Time to take this thing apart. 138 00:08:17,240 --> 00:08:20,640 Oh, welcome to my kitchen! 139 00:08:20,640 --> 00:08:23,600 This is the scene of many a culinary crime. 140 00:08:23,600 --> 00:08:28,360 But today, I'm going to be taking apart this guy. 141 00:08:28,360 --> 00:08:30,800 Maybe gently, maybe less so. 142 00:08:32,600 --> 00:08:35,440 We've got some obvious screws to start with. 143 00:08:35,440 --> 00:08:39,360 How much of my life has been spent just undoing screws 144 00:08:39,360 --> 00:08:41,840 while people point cameras at me? 145 00:08:43,640 --> 00:08:45,680 Oh, there we go! 146 00:08:45,680 --> 00:08:50,560 OK. Don't see this stuff on the other shows about air fryers, 147 00:08:50,560 --> 00:08:53,080 do you? Hmm, Jamie Oliver? 148 00:08:54,760 --> 00:08:58,200 Sitting just behind the heating element in your air fryer 149 00:08:58,200 --> 00:08:59,680 is this little guy. 150 00:08:59,680 --> 00:09:03,400 This is why the food gets nice and crispy. Crispiness, 151 00:09:03,400 --> 00:09:09,400 it's all down to how quickly you can remove the water from food. 152 00:09:09,400 --> 00:09:13,640 Ready for some frying science? In a deep fat fryer, 153 00:09:13,640 --> 00:09:17,760 it's the hot oil doing all of the crispy crust-forming magic. 154 00:09:19,320 --> 00:09:21,880 It gets into all the nooks and crannies of the food 155 00:09:21,880 --> 00:09:25,640 and literally boils and evaporates the water. 156 00:09:25,640 --> 00:09:29,920 And it's that super-fast process which creates the crunch. 157 00:09:29,920 --> 00:09:31,400 But in an air fryer, 158 00:09:31,400 --> 00:09:35,320 it is the movement of hot air that is doing this job, 159 00:09:35,320 --> 00:09:39,680 and the fan is circulating the hot air around the chamber, 160 00:09:39,680 --> 00:09:43,200 whipping the moisture away from the surface of your food 161 00:09:43,200 --> 00:09:45,400 and leaving it nice and crispy. 162 00:09:46,880 --> 00:09:51,040 So, newsflash, air fryers don't actually fry. 163 00:09:51,040 --> 00:09:56,560 They use convection like a regular fan oven, but the fan spins 164 00:09:56,560 --> 00:10:01,480 much faster in a much smaller space, so a vortex of heat can dehydrate 165 00:10:01,480 --> 00:10:04,720 and crisp the surface of the food. 166 00:10:04,720 --> 00:10:08,600 But where did these whirling wonders in our ovens come from? 167 00:10:13,320 --> 00:10:17,960 Well, we have been big time fan fans for centuries, 168 00:10:17,960 --> 00:10:22,800 but to find out how the fantastic fan began to be used for cooking, 169 00:10:22,800 --> 00:10:26,280 we've got to join the ranks of the US Navy. 170 00:10:29,480 --> 00:10:33,400 It's the 1940s, and troops are crisscrossing the globe. 171 00:10:34,960 --> 00:10:39,160 NEWSREEL: And so a score of tired guys pile in to sleep on mail sacks 172 00:10:39,160 --> 00:10:42,880 and crates for another few thousand miles to home. 173 00:10:42,880 --> 00:10:46,040 Life in the sky wasn't exactly glamorous. 174 00:10:46,040 --> 00:10:50,360 The planes were really cold and so was the food. 175 00:10:50,360 --> 00:10:53,680 But one Navy vet was on a mission to make things better. 176 00:10:53,680 --> 00:10:56,680 Enter William L Maxson. 177 00:10:56,680 --> 00:10:59,280 So this guy Maxson, he has this really interesting life. 178 00:10:59,280 --> 00:11:03,000 After he leaves the Navy, he sets up this company inventing all kinds 179 00:11:03,000 --> 00:11:06,240 of bits and pieces for the military. He's got machine gun mounts, 180 00:11:06,240 --> 00:11:09,680 he's got really complicated aerial navigation things, 181 00:11:09,680 --> 00:11:13,000 but the thing that he cares about the absolute most, 182 00:11:13,000 --> 00:11:14,720 the thing that bothers him, 183 00:11:14,720 --> 00:11:18,280 is that the troops can't get a hot meal in the sky. 184 00:11:18,280 --> 00:11:24,120 So Maxson decides it's high time these military meals got a makeover. 185 00:11:24,120 --> 00:11:27,640 He needed food that wouldn't go off on the long flights, 186 00:11:27,640 --> 00:11:29,520 and he had a brainwave. 187 00:11:29,520 --> 00:11:34,240 If he could freeze the food first and then reheat it at speed 188 00:11:34,240 --> 00:11:38,440 in the air, he'd have hot mile-high meals in no time. 189 00:11:38,440 --> 00:11:40,840 Frozen dinners had not been invented at this point. 190 00:11:40,840 --> 00:11:43,280 He was a real trailblazer. Yeah. 191 00:11:43,280 --> 00:11:45,560 That is Ruth Amos. 192 00:11:45,560 --> 00:11:49,920 She's invented more things than you've had hot dinners. 193 00:11:49,920 --> 00:11:53,240 Now, ovens back in the day were big, big ovens. 194 00:11:53,240 --> 00:11:56,400 And so Maxson thought, "Hang on, I want to have a go at building 195 00:11:56,400 --> 00:11:58,520 something that was smaller, a bit more compact, 196 00:11:58,520 --> 00:12:01,360 "and cooks food quicker." And so his thought was, 197 00:12:01,360 --> 00:12:04,240 "Why don't I just put a fan in the back of the oven?" 198 00:12:04,240 --> 00:12:06,040 Now, he's one of the first people to do that. 199 00:12:08,360 --> 00:12:12,560 This was decades before big fan ovens would make an appearance 200 00:12:12,560 --> 00:12:17,080 in our kitchens, and so adding a fan was a ground-breaking move, 201 00:12:17,080 --> 00:12:20,120 allowing him to cook in-flight meals fast. 202 00:12:21,240 --> 00:12:24,680 And Ruth was absolutely delighted when I asked her to slip on 203 00:12:24,680 --> 00:12:28,400 Maxson's gloves and literally build his oven herself. 204 00:12:30,440 --> 00:12:32,400 So I've taken the patent, 205 00:12:32,400 --> 00:12:36,920 I've had a go at making one, and I've not cooked anything in it. 206 00:12:36,920 --> 00:12:39,520 Literally all I've done is took this, built it, 207 00:12:39,520 --> 00:12:42,080 and hoped he knew what he was talking about. 208 00:12:42,080 --> 00:12:45,920 Right, Ruth. Get your oven out for the troops. 209 00:12:45,920 --> 00:12:49,560 Are you ready? Yes. Ta-da-da! 210 00:12:49,560 --> 00:12:54,000 It looks proper, Ruth! It could belong to an airline. 211 00:12:54,000 --> 00:12:57,960 Maxson dubbed his oven the Whirlwind because its design centred 212 00:12:57,960 --> 00:13:01,280 around one thing - whirling wind. 213 00:13:01,280 --> 00:13:05,080 So the fan at the back is the thing that completely changed it. 214 00:13:05,080 --> 00:13:07,120 So there's a fan with a motor, 215 00:13:07,120 --> 00:13:11,480 the air goes through, out the sides of the fan, 216 00:13:11,480 --> 00:13:14,240 past the heating elements, and this door has got that weird 217 00:13:14,240 --> 00:13:16,440 shape on it to direct the air back round. 218 00:13:16,440 --> 00:13:21,120 So his idea is that you cook the food quicker and more evenly 219 00:13:21,120 --> 00:13:24,760 by having that airflow going round the food. 220 00:13:24,760 --> 00:13:27,120 And for dinner... How do you like your steak? 221 00:13:27,120 --> 00:13:29,360 Erm, white with frost on it. 222 00:13:29,360 --> 00:13:30,480 Perfect! 223 00:13:30,480 --> 00:13:36,360 Ruth has lovingly recreated some of Maxson's actual first frozen meals. 224 00:13:36,360 --> 00:13:39,000 Oh! Burger and beans! 225 00:13:39,000 --> 00:13:42,000 That well-known combination of burger and beans. 226 00:13:42,000 --> 00:13:43,400 Shall we put it at the bottom? 227 00:13:43,400 --> 00:13:45,840 How many people are there on this plane? OK... 228 00:13:47,560 --> 00:13:48,640 Oh! 229 00:13:48,640 --> 00:13:50,000 Right, let's get cooking. 230 00:13:51,400 --> 00:13:53,280 It will... So the elements are at the side. 231 00:13:53,280 --> 00:13:55,280 Can you feel the heat? Ooh, yeah. 232 00:13:55,280 --> 00:13:57,880 Ooh, and I can feel it blowing. Yeah! 233 00:13:57,880 --> 00:13:59,920 It's working! 234 00:13:59,920 --> 00:14:03,120 Whether it cooks or not, there is definite airflow. 235 00:14:03,120 --> 00:14:05,840 After just 20 minutes, 236 00:14:05,840 --> 00:14:08,640 Maxson's sky food is starting to smell pretty tasty. 237 00:14:10,160 --> 00:14:13,000 Oh, my word! Go on, give it a go. Give it a go. 238 00:14:13,000 --> 00:14:14,880 OK. There's no smoke. Ooh, no smoke! 239 00:14:14,880 --> 00:14:16,880 HANNAH GASPS, LAUGHS 240 00:14:16,880 --> 00:14:19,520 You've just cooked dinner! Shall we eat? 241 00:14:19,520 --> 00:14:23,160 I am genuinely shocked. You made an oven! 242 00:14:23,160 --> 00:14:25,640 Is it properly cooked? 243 00:14:25,640 --> 00:14:27,720 That's fine! 244 00:14:27,720 --> 00:14:33,000 That is fine! That's fine! The bar is low, but that is fine. 245 00:14:33,000 --> 00:14:37,120 It's cooked. It's chewy as hell! 246 00:14:37,120 --> 00:14:39,360 There's a reason I'm in the workshop, not the kitchen. 247 00:14:40,760 --> 00:14:43,880 The veg is good. I'm not joking. That actually is really nice. 248 00:14:43,880 --> 00:14:45,320 It's really nice! 249 00:14:47,040 --> 00:14:49,760 And luckily, the troops agreed. 250 00:14:49,760 --> 00:14:52,000 The Navy started packing Whirlwinds, 251 00:14:52,000 --> 00:14:55,400 and commercial airlines jumped on board too. 252 00:14:55,400 --> 00:14:58,920 NEWSREEL: Each dinner hour brings pleasant relaxation. 253 00:14:58,920 --> 00:15:02,960 But it would be another 60 years before Maxson's fan technology 254 00:15:02,960 --> 00:15:05,120 would turn into the air fryer... 255 00:15:06,720 --> 00:15:09,040 ..all thanks to a frying Dutchman. 256 00:15:10,360 --> 00:15:12,120 I'm Suus van der Weij. 257 00:15:12,120 --> 00:15:16,000 My dad's Fred van der Weij, the inventor of the air fryer. 258 00:15:18,560 --> 00:15:22,360 And that makes Suus the air fryer heir. 259 00:15:23,920 --> 00:15:27,200 Fred sadly passed away in 2022, 260 00:15:27,200 --> 00:15:28,920 but back in the early 2000s, 261 00:15:28,920 --> 00:15:32,920 he was constantly cooking up new ideas in his garage. 262 00:15:32,920 --> 00:15:35,320 So I called him the Nutty Professor. 263 00:15:35,320 --> 00:15:38,960 He's an inventor, so he's all over the place. 264 00:15:40,400 --> 00:15:42,360 But a quick chinwag in 2006 265 00:15:42,360 --> 00:15:46,120 changed the course of his entire inventing career. 266 00:15:47,240 --> 00:15:50,600 My neighbour came around, they started talking about fryers, 267 00:15:50,600 --> 00:15:54,400 like deep fryers and how dangerous they are. 268 00:15:54,400 --> 00:15:59,920 And that's when he was thinking, like, "Maybe this could be safer." 269 00:15:59,920 --> 00:16:04,480 Fred became totally obsessed with creating a way to cook delicious 270 00:16:04,480 --> 00:16:08,960 crispy fries without the danger and calories of hot oil. 271 00:16:08,960 --> 00:16:13,720 His first step was creating a fan-powered prototype. 272 00:16:13,720 --> 00:16:18,440 Well, this is the very first air fryer. 273 00:16:18,440 --> 00:16:23,280 This is the huge wooden monster that my dad built. 274 00:16:25,080 --> 00:16:26,680 You can see here, 275 00:16:26,680 --> 00:16:31,800 this is how he made it with aluminium and chicken wire. 276 00:16:31,800 --> 00:16:35,280 Fred dubbed his chicken coop cooker the Frites Air 277 00:16:35,280 --> 00:16:39,600 and used it to make mountains of fries for the family. 278 00:16:39,600 --> 00:16:41,360 Oh, they were terrible! 279 00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:48,120 So they were coming out, erm, still a bit frozen, 280 00:16:48,120 --> 00:16:51,040 but the tips were burned, 281 00:16:51,040 --> 00:16:55,560 and they were all sweaty and kind of floppy-ish. 282 00:16:55,560 --> 00:16:59,440 Even with the fan, Fred wasn't getting the right airflow, 283 00:16:59,440 --> 00:17:02,480 and his frites weren't frying evenly. 284 00:17:02,480 --> 00:17:06,280 He needed a way to see what that air was up to. 285 00:17:06,280 --> 00:17:09,000 My dad and his colleagues, they stood in a circle 286 00:17:09,000 --> 00:17:15,000 around this big machine, and got as many cigarettes 287 00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:19,440 as they could in their mouths, and all started, er, 288 00:17:19,440 --> 00:17:23,720 blowing the smoke up the machine to see where the smoke went 289 00:17:23,720 --> 00:17:27,040 and see if the technology works or not. 290 00:17:28,360 --> 00:17:31,360 And the result of all of that...finessing 291 00:17:31,360 --> 00:17:35,480 was the first iteration of Emiel's four-armed starfish. 292 00:17:36,760 --> 00:17:41,600 This is the very first idea of the rapid air technology, 293 00:17:41,600 --> 00:17:42,960 the cross. 294 00:17:45,240 --> 00:17:49,920 All of Fred's time, energy, and money went into refining 295 00:17:49,920 --> 00:17:51,240 his fryer designs. 296 00:17:52,520 --> 00:17:55,720 It led to a lot of fights in the house. 297 00:17:55,720 --> 00:18:01,280 And, er, I believe at some point I thought he was just 298 00:18:01,280 --> 00:18:04,800 living in the garage. He couldn't lose faith. 299 00:18:04,800 --> 00:18:06,440 That was the whole thing. 300 00:18:06,440 --> 00:18:11,280 He was betting on this horse and this horse alone, 301 00:18:11,280 --> 00:18:13,520 and we don't have anything else, 302 00:18:13,520 --> 00:18:16,560 so we need this horse to win the race. 303 00:18:16,560 --> 00:18:19,920 But after four years and near bankruptcy, 304 00:18:19,920 --> 00:18:22,400 Fred perfected the Frites Air, 305 00:18:22,400 --> 00:18:25,840 and started pitching it to manufacturers. 306 00:18:25,840 --> 00:18:30,640 Dutch brand Phillips loved it and bought Fred's patent. 307 00:18:30,640 --> 00:18:34,080 I remember exactly when he got the news. 308 00:18:34,080 --> 00:18:37,240 He came out of the garage with tears in his eyes, he said, 309 00:18:37,240 --> 00:18:43,080 "They said yes, and they wired the first amount. 310 00:18:43,080 --> 00:18:46,880 "And we don't need to sell the house and we don't need to..." 311 00:18:46,880 --> 00:18:51,080 And we're... Getting all emotional thinking about it, 312 00:18:51,080 --> 00:18:56,360 but, er, yeah, we all... There was this, this... 313 00:18:56,360 --> 00:19:00,200 ..this weight coming off our shoulders. 314 00:19:00,200 --> 00:19:04,760 But Phillips did make one pretty big change - the name. 315 00:19:04,760 --> 00:19:08,480 He came home and he said, "Yeah, so it's not the Frites Air. 316 00:19:08,480 --> 00:19:11,640 "No, it's the air fryer." I'm saying, "Air fryer?! 317 00:19:11,640 --> 00:19:15,360 "What kind of name is air fryer?" You know. 318 00:19:16,680 --> 00:19:21,640 After going on sale in 2010, Fred was able to watch it steadily 319 00:19:21,640 --> 00:19:24,920 grow in popularity before he passed away. 320 00:19:24,920 --> 00:19:27,080 I'm really proud. Yeah. 321 00:19:27,080 --> 00:19:31,000 Yeah, and I can't wait to tell my kids that their grandad invented 322 00:19:31,000 --> 00:19:32,680 the air fryer. 323 00:19:32,680 --> 00:19:35,400 Since Fred's first cooker hit the shelves, 324 00:19:35,400 --> 00:19:38,480 around 80 million air fryers have been sold. 325 00:19:38,480 --> 00:19:42,160 And at the heart of every single one is a powerful fan. 326 00:19:44,160 --> 00:19:47,640 And for Mr Maxson and Fred, that's a pretty fantastic legacy, 327 00:19:47,640 --> 00:19:48,840 if you ask me. 328 00:19:53,200 --> 00:19:57,160 All of that air gets our food crispy, but the fan would be nothing 329 00:19:57,160 --> 00:19:59,800 without our next component. 330 00:19:59,800 --> 00:20:03,720 It's the wire that punches above its weight to pump out heat 331 00:20:03,720 --> 00:20:08,160 and cook your food super fast - it's the heating element. 332 00:20:10,600 --> 00:20:14,240 I'm back in the Netherlands with more weighty questions. 333 00:20:14,240 --> 00:20:16,720 What's the weirdest thing you've ever cooked in your air fryer? 334 00:20:16,720 --> 00:20:19,280 I tried to grill a watermelon. 335 00:20:20,800 --> 00:20:24,080 Nice experiment, but I would say don't do it at home. 336 00:20:25,600 --> 00:20:29,120 That is Dr Tim Van de Graaff, generator of air fryers 337 00:20:29,120 --> 00:20:31,160 and novel fruit-based recipes. 338 00:20:33,080 --> 00:20:36,080 Whether it's chips or chocolate cake, 339 00:20:36,080 --> 00:20:41,440 air fryers can cook in roughly half the time of your conventional oven. 340 00:20:41,440 --> 00:20:47,600 Tim wants to show me how that speed starts with one thing - fast heat. 341 00:20:47,600 --> 00:20:51,760 My favourite thing about this set-up is that you've got the type of clock 342 00:20:51,760 --> 00:20:55,120 that you would expect to see at the 100m final in the Olympics! 343 00:20:55,120 --> 00:20:59,800 Because I want to show you how rapid this heating element... 344 00:20:59,800 --> 00:21:06,200 It goes from normal temperatures up to 400, 450 Celsius 345 00:21:06,200 --> 00:21:08,080 in only a few minutes. 346 00:21:08,080 --> 00:21:11,720 OK, it's the Heating Element Temperature Olympics. 347 00:21:11,720 --> 00:21:14,480 All right. One, two... 348 00:21:14,480 --> 00:21:17,840 ..three. OK, so already at 11 seconds, the heating element 349 00:21:17,840 --> 00:21:20,200 is at 42... 50 degrees. 350 00:21:20,200 --> 00:21:21,320 OK. 351 00:21:21,320 --> 00:21:25,040 We are up to 80, 90 degrees. 352 00:21:25,040 --> 00:21:29,240 So it took let's say 24 seconds to get up to boiling. 353 00:21:29,240 --> 00:21:31,280 That's incredible. Mm-hm. 354 00:21:31,280 --> 00:21:34,240 The heating element is already hotter than you would want food 355 00:21:34,240 --> 00:21:38,320 to be. 220 degrees. Because this heats up the air, 356 00:21:38,320 --> 00:21:41,120 and the air flows down around the bucket 357 00:21:41,120 --> 00:21:43,560 and then reaches the chicken. 358 00:21:43,560 --> 00:21:48,960 So with 450 Celsius, you can cook at temperatures about 200. 359 00:21:50,800 --> 00:21:54,600 Now, this heating element is very similar to the one in your oven. 360 00:21:54,600 --> 00:21:58,280 They both heat air that then cooks your food, 361 00:21:58,280 --> 00:22:02,960 but your air fryer cooks faster because there is a far smaller space 362 00:22:02,960 --> 00:22:06,680 to heat up, so the heat gets into your food quicker. 363 00:22:06,680 --> 00:22:11,520 And thanks to this speed, an air fryer uses around half the energy 364 00:22:11,520 --> 00:22:16,560 of an electric oven, benefiting both your plate and your planet, 365 00:22:16,560 --> 00:22:19,320 depending on the size of the meal, of course. 366 00:22:19,320 --> 00:22:22,840 Kind of tough to cram Christmas dinner into one of these. 367 00:22:22,840 --> 00:22:25,480 If I was to cook this in a normal oven, I would give it 368 00:22:25,480 --> 00:22:29,720 at least 40 minutes. This will be around 20, 25 minutes. 369 00:22:29,720 --> 00:22:32,160 I mean, that's like a factor of two. Let's take it out. 370 00:22:32,160 --> 00:22:34,240 OK, deal. Deal. 371 00:22:34,240 --> 00:22:36,920 So that was 20 minutes. I'd eat that. 372 00:22:36,920 --> 00:22:38,600 I mean, I would say perfectly cooked, 373 00:22:38,600 --> 00:22:40,720 but it's got no salt or pepper on it. 374 00:22:43,120 --> 00:22:44,920 I think I'll skip lunch. 375 00:22:44,920 --> 00:22:48,280 Time to head back to the kitchen for some hot to trot physics. 376 00:22:52,080 --> 00:22:56,280 So this right here, this curly-wurly wire, this is your heating element, 377 00:22:56,280 --> 00:23:00,720 but the most important part is actually hiding inside. 378 00:23:02,760 --> 00:23:05,320 Excited? Good. You should be. 379 00:23:08,440 --> 00:23:11,520 The important part. Look at this! 380 00:23:11,520 --> 00:23:14,840 Ooh, there it is, the crucial bit. 381 00:23:14,840 --> 00:23:18,880 The heart of your air fryer is this teeny, teeny, teeny, tiny wire. 382 00:23:18,880 --> 00:23:21,880 Look how skinny it is. I mean, that is pretty amazing, isn't it? 383 00:23:21,880 --> 00:23:26,920 Right, that it's like 250 degrees almost instantly, 384 00:23:26,920 --> 00:23:31,080 and it's this almost laughably small wire that's doing all the work. 385 00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:35,640 And that is no easy physics feat, 386 00:23:35,640 --> 00:23:38,640 let me tell you. It requires a special metal, 387 00:23:38,640 --> 00:23:41,480 a wire with a bit of welly, as it were. 388 00:23:41,480 --> 00:23:46,760 It all comes down to a very particular metal alloy 389 00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:51,160 called nichrome, which of course I keep in my kitchen drawer 390 00:23:51,160 --> 00:23:53,680 in a wild tangle. 391 00:23:53,680 --> 00:23:57,320 Just shove that back in. That's fine. Here it is. 392 00:23:57,320 --> 00:24:01,360 Nichrome has an extremely high resistance... 393 00:24:01,360 --> 00:24:04,320 OK, a bite-sized bit of physics. 394 00:24:04,320 --> 00:24:07,520 Resistance is how hard it is for electrons, 395 00:24:07,520 --> 00:24:11,240 those teeny tiny charged particles which carry electrical energy, 396 00:24:11,240 --> 00:24:13,960 to travel through a wire. 397 00:24:13,960 --> 00:24:16,560 Every time you wire up an electrical circuit, 398 00:24:16,560 --> 00:24:20,000 you're creating a path for those electrons to flow. 399 00:24:20,000 --> 00:24:23,520 But if you use nichrome wire, it's a real struggle 400 00:24:23,520 --> 00:24:27,560 for those little electrons to work their way along that path. 401 00:24:27,560 --> 00:24:30,080 As the electrons move along, they bump and they bash 402 00:24:30,080 --> 00:24:32,320 into all of the atoms and the ions in the way, 403 00:24:32,320 --> 00:24:37,520 and those collisions create heat, which you can see quite neatly, 404 00:24:37,520 --> 00:24:41,720 if you connect this up to a power source. 405 00:24:41,720 --> 00:24:45,440 Imagine those little electrons are trying really hard 406 00:24:45,440 --> 00:24:48,800 to move through an incredibly crowded room. 407 00:24:48,800 --> 00:24:51,520 Let's snip off a little bit of this. 408 00:24:51,520 --> 00:24:54,720 It's difficult to pass through without crashing into other 409 00:24:54,720 --> 00:24:58,080 particles, and it's this jostling about, this resistance, 410 00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:01,120 which turns the electrical energy into heat. 411 00:25:03,400 --> 00:25:04,840 Let's have a little look. 412 00:25:04,840 --> 00:25:07,560 As soon as that electricity starts flowing, 413 00:25:07,560 --> 00:25:10,120 we should see that heat in action. 414 00:25:14,440 --> 00:25:16,960 Ooh! Immediately smoking! Did you see that? 415 00:25:16,960 --> 00:25:21,760 Oh, my gosh! Look! How extraordinary! 416 00:25:21,760 --> 00:25:23,640 There we go. Look at that. Red hot! 417 00:25:23,640 --> 00:25:26,120 That's hot enough to, air fry your food... 418 00:25:26,120 --> 00:25:30,000 I would say this is slightly riskier than just using a lighter. 419 00:25:30,000 --> 00:25:33,400 ..or dangerously set things alight in my kitchen. 420 00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:34,960 SHE GASPS 421 00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:39,120 Do you reckon I can singe a bit of paper? 422 00:25:39,120 --> 00:25:40,680 If I set off my fire alarm... 423 00:25:42,040 --> 00:25:44,440 Is this a stupid idea? Probably. 424 00:25:46,960 --> 00:25:49,720 Just, like, cuts through it. 425 00:25:49,720 --> 00:25:53,760 Oh, look at that little flame! Oh, that is satisfying. 426 00:25:55,160 --> 00:25:59,200 OK, I think I'm going to turn this off before I burn down my kitchen. 427 00:25:59,200 --> 00:26:03,160 But not every metal is suited to the job of cooking your dinner. 428 00:26:03,160 --> 00:26:07,720 Now, copper has an incredibly low resistance, 429 00:26:07,720 --> 00:26:12,680 and that means there's no bumping around that causes heat in the wire. 430 00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:15,880 And that's perfect when you are wiring things in your house. 431 00:26:15,880 --> 00:26:18,160 You don't want to spontaneously combust your kitchen 432 00:26:18,160 --> 00:26:19,760 every time you turn a light on. 433 00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:22,880 If I put some electricity through here now... 434 00:26:22,880 --> 00:26:24,800 OK. There's no smoking. 435 00:26:26,560 --> 00:26:30,480 There's no candle lighting. And in fact, apparently... 436 00:26:32,120 --> 00:26:35,920 Oh! You can touch it. It's completely cold. 437 00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:39,000 From the big beefy wires in your grill 438 00:26:39,000 --> 00:26:41,280 to the dainty ones in your toaster, 439 00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:45,280 nichrome heating elements are everywhere in our kitchens. 440 00:26:45,280 --> 00:26:48,480 But to find out exactly where they came from, 441 00:26:48,480 --> 00:26:51,320 we've got to take a trip down cooking memory lane. 442 00:26:54,800 --> 00:26:59,880 So first man, or maybe woman, made fire and gave cooking a whirl. 443 00:26:59,880 --> 00:27:02,560 NEWSREEL: When he did, the results were chancy. 444 00:27:02,560 --> 00:27:07,120 Partly raw, partly burnt, smoky, covered with ash. 445 00:27:07,120 --> 00:27:09,880 Sounds like a Fry special, to be honest with you. 446 00:27:09,880 --> 00:27:13,200 By the 13th century, he had pots and ovens. 447 00:27:13,200 --> 00:27:15,520 The improvements went on over the years. 448 00:27:17,440 --> 00:27:20,800 Early stoves just burned wood and coal. 449 00:27:20,800 --> 00:27:25,120 But then in the 1880s, the first gas-fuelled cookers came along. 450 00:27:25,120 --> 00:27:28,200 I assume, sir, that madam will wish to replace this kitchen range 451 00:27:28,200 --> 00:27:31,200 with a modern gas stove. Oh, Richard, do let us. 452 00:27:31,200 --> 00:27:34,680 I am told they are really a quite wonderful invention. 453 00:27:34,680 --> 00:27:38,920 But a couple of decades later, a crazy chemist would turn 454 00:27:38,920 --> 00:27:42,840 to electricity, and cooking would never be the same again. 455 00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:50,040 It all begins in 1905 with this dapper Yank 456 00:27:50,040 --> 00:27:53,840 and metal obsessive, Mr Albert Marsh. 457 00:27:53,840 --> 00:27:55,920 Let's call him Bertie. 458 00:27:55,920 --> 00:27:59,600 This is about the time that everyone is getting really excited 459 00:27:59,600 --> 00:28:03,480 about the new kid on the block, electricity. 460 00:28:03,480 --> 00:28:05,480 And Albert Marsh has this idea. 461 00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:10,360 He thinks it should be possible to convert heat 462 00:28:10,360 --> 00:28:12,520 into electrical energy. 463 00:28:12,520 --> 00:28:16,120 Spoiler alert - this ambitious science project 464 00:28:16,120 --> 00:28:20,200 isn't what would make our Bertie rich and famous. 465 00:28:20,200 --> 00:28:24,280 He sets out to create a new metal that could withstand such 466 00:28:24,280 --> 00:28:28,400 high temperatures, it would literally start an electric spark. 467 00:28:28,400 --> 00:28:31,440 So Marsh starts experimenting, getting different metals, 468 00:28:31,440 --> 00:28:35,640 mixing them together, and it's difficult, because lots of metals, 469 00:28:35,640 --> 00:28:38,560 they get up to high temperatures, they end up melting, 470 00:28:38,560 --> 00:28:40,600 they get too soft, they disintegrate. 471 00:28:40,600 --> 00:28:45,560 Other metals, they oxidise, they get too brittle, they end up cracking. 472 00:28:45,560 --> 00:28:48,840 But one day, Bertie tried a new recipe, 473 00:28:48,840 --> 00:28:53,560 mixing together two metals with very different properties. 474 00:28:53,560 --> 00:28:58,120 The first of which is nickel, which is very common at the time, 475 00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:01,240 but also another metal called chromium. 476 00:29:01,240 --> 00:29:04,800 Now this stuff, you find it in pigments for paints, 477 00:29:04,800 --> 00:29:07,720 but also in agents for softening leather. 478 00:29:07,720 --> 00:29:13,080 But very specifically, he tried a recipe which was 90% nickel 479 00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:15,360 and 10% chromium. 480 00:29:15,360 --> 00:29:21,200 You know what? Today, I'm going to put on my big boy Bertie Marsh pants 481 00:29:21,200 --> 00:29:24,760 and try and make some of this myself. 482 00:29:24,760 --> 00:29:29,000 First, weigh out your ingredients, 483 00:29:29,000 --> 00:29:30,880 then add heat. 484 00:29:30,880 --> 00:29:32,400 Have a look. 485 00:29:32,400 --> 00:29:36,240 Whoa! That's bright. Whoa! That's bright! Exactly. 486 00:29:36,240 --> 00:29:37,840 Stir continuously. 487 00:29:37,840 --> 00:29:40,720 Oh, my God, this is so cool! It's red hot. 488 00:29:40,720 --> 00:29:43,240 It's swirling in that dish, 489 00:29:43,240 --> 00:29:47,600 and it is really a thing of great beauty. 490 00:29:47,600 --> 00:29:49,240 The recipe is ready. 491 00:29:49,240 --> 00:29:53,040 And after five minutes cooking... voila. 492 00:29:53,040 --> 00:29:55,160 Ooh, wow! 493 00:29:55,160 --> 00:29:59,640 SHE GASPS 494 00:29:55,160 --> 00:29:59,640 Oh, my goodness! 495 00:29:59,640 --> 00:30:05,400 Bertie's brand-new metal was strong and didn't oxidise, but crucially, 496 00:30:05,400 --> 00:30:09,520 it was still pliable enough to stretch. 497 00:30:09,520 --> 00:30:16,040 And so Marsh painstakingly spun this stuff out into a long, thin wire, 498 00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:17,480 at which point 499 00:30:17,480 --> 00:30:21,000 he noticed that it had some quite surprising properties. 500 00:30:21,000 --> 00:30:23,600 When you put electricity through this, 501 00:30:23,600 --> 00:30:26,600 it has phenomenally high resistance, 502 00:30:26,600 --> 00:30:29,240 which means that it gets very, very hot, 503 00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:33,440 and yet it neither melts nor becomes brittle. 504 00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:36,800 It was a moment of triumph for our Bertie, 505 00:30:36,800 --> 00:30:39,920 just maybe not the triumph he'd been aiming for. 506 00:30:39,920 --> 00:30:43,040 He'd wanted to turn heat into electrical energy, 507 00:30:43,040 --> 00:30:47,840 but here he'd found the substance that could turn electrical energy 508 00:30:47,840 --> 00:30:49,520 into heat. 509 00:30:49,520 --> 00:30:51,800 He decided to call it Chromel, 510 00:30:51,800 --> 00:30:55,520 and in 1907, he patented a new device, a portable stove, 511 00:30:55,520 --> 00:30:59,560 which had coils of this stuff inside as a heating element. 512 00:30:59,560 --> 00:31:01,960 He said in the patent that it could be adapted for use 513 00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:04,040 as a toaster. 514 00:31:04,040 --> 00:31:09,480 That's right, Bertie had basically invented the first-ever toaster. 515 00:31:09,480 --> 00:31:13,000 Now, you would think, given that this was literally the best thing 516 00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:17,360 since sliced bread, surely he had made an absolute fortune. 517 00:31:17,360 --> 00:31:22,880 But actually, the patent kind of went a bit unnoticed until 1910, 518 00:31:22,880 --> 00:31:28,480 when General Electric released a suspiciously similar portable stove 519 00:31:28,480 --> 00:31:33,360 that used coils of this special metal alloy inside. 520 00:31:33,360 --> 00:31:38,800 So Bertie sued the big boys of the electrical world, and won. 521 00:31:38,800 --> 00:31:44,120 And then old Bertie Marsh sailed off into the sunset, 522 00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:48,680 surrounded by an infinite number of perfectly toasted slices of bread. 523 00:31:51,280 --> 00:31:52,760 Hey! 524 00:31:52,760 --> 00:31:55,920 From then on, things really started hotting up. 525 00:31:57,360 --> 00:31:58,400 Is it good? 526 00:31:59,520 --> 00:32:03,640 By the 1940s, our homes were starting to fill with 527 00:32:03,640 --> 00:32:08,320 hot new gadgets that used Bertie's Chromel heating element. 528 00:32:08,320 --> 00:32:09,840 Woman's work is never done. 529 00:32:09,840 --> 00:32:11,960 "Stuff and nonsense," says the electric washer. 530 00:32:11,960 --> 00:32:14,080 "It's not true," says the electric iron. 531 00:32:14,080 --> 00:32:16,240 "It's ridiculous, "says the electric toaster. 532 00:32:16,240 --> 00:32:18,040 "Crazy," says the electric fire. 533 00:32:18,040 --> 00:32:20,680 Yeah, OK. Pipe down, electrical appliances. 534 00:32:20,680 --> 00:32:23,760 Your arrival didn't exactly abolish the patriarchy. 535 00:32:23,760 --> 00:32:26,000 Gracious, no! 536 00:32:26,000 --> 00:32:30,520 Bertie Marsh's nickel-chromium mixture became widely known 537 00:32:30,520 --> 00:32:32,720 as nichrome. Sound familiar? 538 00:32:32,720 --> 00:32:35,680 And it's this tiny hidden heating wire 539 00:32:35,680 --> 00:32:38,800 you can still thank for your hot dinners today. 540 00:32:42,920 --> 00:32:46,960 Our next component is the slick, slippery surface inside 541 00:32:46,960 --> 00:32:49,560 of our air fryer. 542 00:32:49,560 --> 00:32:52,400 It's the non-stick coating. 543 00:32:55,080 --> 00:32:57,920 Let's get a grip of this slippery stuff. 544 00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:02,520 The inside of an air fryer is coated in a very particular resin 545 00:33:02,520 --> 00:33:05,720 called polytetrafluoroethylene. 546 00:33:05,720 --> 00:33:09,680 That's PTFE for short, or Teflon. 547 00:33:11,000 --> 00:33:12,560 It's very clever stuff. 548 00:33:12,560 --> 00:33:14,320 You see it on a lot of kitchenware, 549 00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:17,800 and it is there to make cooking and cleaning a lot easier. 550 00:33:17,800 --> 00:33:23,160 Now, broadly, I consider the phrase "non-stick" to be a challenge, 551 00:33:23,160 --> 00:33:27,440 rather than a statement. I am very good at cremating food. 552 00:33:27,440 --> 00:33:31,200 But PTFE always seems to do what it says on the tin, 553 00:33:31,200 --> 00:33:34,480 even against my superior burning skills. 554 00:33:38,280 --> 00:33:41,720 So, to show you just how non-stick this stuff is, 555 00:33:41,720 --> 00:33:44,760 I've brought along an extremely sticky assistant. 556 00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:48,040 So this is little George. 557 00:33:48,040 --> 00:33:49,320 He's a gecko. 558 00:33:49,320 --> 00:33:51,800 Don't worry. I'm not going to air fry George. 559 00:33:52,960 --> 00:33:57,800 These little guys are the Spider-Men of the lizard world. 560 00:33:57,800 --> 00:33:59,000 Come on, mister. 561 00:33:59,000 --> 00:34:01,720 They literally stick to everything, 562 00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:04,160 even this pane of glass. 563 00:34:04,160 --> 00:34:07,240 You can see he's quite happy sticking on it. 564 00:34:08,560 --> 00:34:13,200 Look at that. Do you see? Quite happy to just climb up glass. 565 00:34:13,200 --> 00:34:18,240 Now, the reason why George is able to stick on to this glass 566 00:34:18,240 --> 00:34:21,400 is because he has these tiny little microscopic hairs 567 00:34:21,400 --> 00:34:22,760 on the bottom of his feet. 568 00:34:22,760 --> 00:34:25,840 The molecules of those hairs interact with the molecules 569 00:34:25,840 --> 00:34:30,960 of the glass, and it creates an electromagnetic attraction, 570 00:34:30,960 --> 00:34:34,200 allowing him to seemingly climb the impossible. 571 00:34:35,800 --> 00:34:41,880 Now let's see how the stickiest guy in town fares against my PTFE. 572 00:34:41,880 --> 00:34:44,000 Are you ready, baby George? 573 00:34:44,000 --> 00:34:46,600 Let me just show you this. 574 00:34:46,600 --> 00:34:48,160 Little guy! 575 00:34:48,160 --> 00:34:50,840 Ooh! Oh! Bless him! 576 00:34:50,840 --> 00:34:55,880 Now, the reason that George is having trouble here 577 00:34:55,880 --> 00:35:00,160 is because of the chemical structure of Teflon 578 00:35:00,160 --> 00:35:03,680 means that that same interaction doesn't happen. 579 00:35:03,680 --> 00:35:07,680 He's got no grip, and he's sliding down. Oh, mister! 580 00:35:07,680 --> 00:35:10,040 I think we'll stop there for you. 581 00:35:10,040 --> 00:35:14,000 But to understand exactly what's happening at that microscopic level, 582 00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:17,440 first you have to understand where PTFE came from. 583 00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:21,920 Let's journey back to the dark times. 584 00:35:21,920 --> 00:35:23,760 ADVERT: Remember way back when, 585 00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:26,120 when eggs used to stick to the frying pan, 586 00:35:26,120 --> 00:35:29,480 when almost everything used to stick to roasting pans? 587 00:35:29,480 --> 00:35:33,120 The era before non-stick pans. 588 00:35:33,120 --> 00:35:36,360 The story of Teflon's discovery is one of those great ones of science. 589 00:35:36,360 --> 00:35:38,520 It was a complete accident. 590 00:35:38,520 --> 00:35:42,800 That's our materials girl, Dr Anna Ploszajski. 591 00:35:42,800 --> 00:35:46,800 Right, Anna, let's head to the 1930s. 592 00:35:46,800 --> 00:35:49,760 It was a very young chemist called Roy Plunkett who was working 593 00:35:49,760 --> 00:35:51,400 at a company called DuPont. 594 00:35:51,400 --> 00:35:55,160 Back then, the refrigerant gases that they had to basically 595 00:35:55,160 --> 00:35:58,640 make things cold were nasty, toxic, smelly, 596 00:35:58,640 --> 00:36:01,200 so he was working on safer refrigerant gases. 597 00:36:01,200 --> 00:36:04,560 Trying to find a better alternative. Exactly. 598 00:36:04,560 --> 00:36:08,440 Then one fateful day, Roy arrived at work 599 00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:11,320 and, well, changed the world. 600 00:36:11,320 --> 00:36:14,760 One morning, he opened the valve to a gas cylinder 601 00:36:14,760 --> 00:36:17,080 and nothing came out. And he thought, "That's strange. 602 00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:18,520 "I know there's some gas in there." 603 00:36:18,520 --> 00:36:21,840 So he took the gas cylinder off, sawed it in half... 604 00:36:21,840 --> 00:36:24,240 Of course. ..to open it up. Classic. 605 00:36:24,240 --> 00:36:28,960 And inside he found not a gas, but this kind of powdery white 606 00:36:28,960 --> 00:36:32,360 solid material, which was unexpected. Yeah. 607 00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:37,520 Sure, Roy's gas experiment was ruined, 608 00:36:37,520 --> 00:36:42,560 but it turns out he'd actually created a brand-new plastic. 609 00:36:42,560 --> 00:36:47,040 Brace yourself, people, it's hardcore chemistry o'clock. 610 00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:50,480 In their gas cylinder was tetrafluoroethylene, 611 00:36:50,480 --> 00:36:54,880 this refrigerant gas, and the molecules of that look like this. 612 00:36:54,880 --> 00:36:57,200 There's two carbon atoms, 613 00:36:57,200 --> 00:37:01,920 and on each of those carbons, there are two fluorines. OK. 614 00:37:01,920 --> 00:37:06,800 But they think the iron in Roy's canister, under high pressure, 615 00:37:06,800 --> 00:37:11,600 kick-started a chemical reaction that turned the gas into a polymer, 616 00:37:11,600 --> 00:37:14,120 a long chain of molecules. 617 00:37:14,120 --> 00:37:17,600 So it's now many molecules all bonded together. OK. 618 00:37:17,600 --> 00:37:20,680 So this is tetrafluoroethylene, 619 00:37:20,680 --> 00:37:24,680 and the white solid is polytetrafluoroethylene. 620 00:37:24,680 --> 00:37:27,480 PTFE. PTFE. Mm! 621 00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:33,320 And this specific chemical structure gave this new polymer superpowers. 622 00:37:33,320 --> 00:37:38,080 This fluorine carbon bond is very, very, very strong. 623 00:37:38,080 --> 00:37:39,560 Because of the chemistry of it, 624 00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:41,920 it means that these love bonding together, 625 00:37:41,920 --> 00:37:44,040 and they love bonding together so much that actually 626 00:37:44,040 --> 00:37:46,120 they're not really interested in anyone else. OK. 627 00:37:46,120 --> 00:37:50,480 So if you're a water molecule, say, you come along, 628 00:37:50,480 --> 00:37:52,400 say, "Can I come and sit with you guys?" 629 00:37:52,400 --> 00:37:54,080 Right, these are the mean girls. 630 00:37:54,080 --> 00:37:57,520 They're like, "You can't sit with us." 631 00:37:57,520 --> 00:38:02,360 This chemical rejection makes the material non-stick. 632 00:38:02,360 --> 00:38:07,240 Now, this chemistry dance is all happening at the nano level... 633 00:38:07,240 --> 00:38:10,000 So I'm just going to make a little water droplet. 634 00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:13,600 ..but we can see it play out using just a macro lens, 635 00:38:13,600 --> 00:38:16,680 some water, and a pane of glass. 636 00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:19,560 And what I want you to notice is the shape of the droplet. 637 00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:21,640 Yeah. It's like, quite, flat. Yeah. 638 00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:25,360 In fact, the water wants to spread over the glass. 639 00:38:25,360 --> 00:38:27,760 And so they... They love each other. They love each other. 640 00:38:27,760 --> 00:38:29,080 They're having a great time. 641 00:38:29,080 --> 00:38:31,680 But do the same thing on PTFE... 642 00:38:34,000 --> 00:38:36,960 Oh, wow! Look at that! 643 00:38:36,960 --> 00:38:39,800 It's nowhere near as spread out. Exactly. 644 00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:42,760 It's much more rounded. It's sort of beaded up. Yeah. 645 00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:45,280 And this is because the water doesn't want to stick, 646 00:38:45,280 --> 00:38:47,840 so it's trying to reduce the surface area underneath. 647 00:38:47,840 --> 00:38:51,120 So it's... Yeah, it's sort of sucking itself into a little ball. 648 00:38:51,120 --> 00:38:55,400 And this is all down to the molecules on the surface? 649 00:38:55,400 --> 00:38:57,040 Yeah. Those mean girls. 650 00:38:58,880 --> 00:39:04,520 In 1945, DuPont renamed their wonder material Teflon. 651 00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:09,480 Teflon has been characterised as a lucky accident, 652 00:39:09,480 --> 00:39:13,720 an example of serendipity, and a flash of genius. 653 00:39:13,720 --> 00:39:17,400 It would go on to be used in everything from space shuttles 654 00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:18,960 to raincoats. 655 00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:22,760 New fibres with new benefits that never existed before. 656 00:39:22,760 --> 00:39:27,280 And in the 1950s, it made its way into our kitchens. 657 00:39:27,280 --> 00:39:29,880 I've got great news for you. 658 00:39:29,880 --> 00:39:33,280 And it's right under this macaroni and cheese. 659 00:39:33,280 --> 00:39:35,880 It didn't melt or corrode. 660 00:39:35,880 --> 00:39:37,760 It was super durable. 661 00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:40,360 Right on, Miss Teflon Two. 662 00:39:40,360 --> 00:39:43,480 And of course, non-stick. 663 00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:45,920 # Don't make a meal without that seal... # 664 00:39:45,920 --> 00:39:51,000 A complete cooking revolution, all thanks to Roy's happy accident. 665 00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:54,280 And I was introduced as God's gift to the housewives. 666 00:39:54,280 --> 00:39:57,320 Well, hold up right there, Roy! 667 00:39:57,320 --> 00:40:00,720 I'm afraid it hasn't been total smooth sailing for Teflon 668 00:40:00,720 --> 00:40:04,280 in the 80-odd years since your invention. 669 00:40:04,280 --> 00:40:07,600 See, although today's Teflon is deemed safe to use, 670 00:40:07,600 --> 00:40:09,280 it comes with a bit of baggage. 671 00:40:12,160 --> 00:40:15,640 In the 1980s, it came out that the chemicals 672 00:40:15,640 --> 00:40:17,600 used to make PTFE could be toxic. 673 00:40:18,920 --> 00:40:22,440 Despite changes to the manufacturing process to make it safer, 674 00:40:22,440 --> 00:40:25,920 the stuff has remained controversial. 675 00:40:25,920 --> 00:40:28,800 So ARE we safe to air fry? 676 00:40:28,800 --> 00:40:32,960 Are you at risk when you're cooking with it, then? No, completely not. 677 00:40:32,960 --> 00:40:34,920 That is Dr Ted Pajak 678 00:40:34,920 --> 00:40:36,680 from research and development 679 00:40:36,680 --> 00:40:38,760 at air fryer makers Versuni. 680 00:40:38,760 --> 00:40:41,960 Because as long as you use it according to its application, 681 00:40:41,960 --> 00:40:44,160 it's absolutely perfectly safe. 682 00:40:44,160 --> 00:40:46,720 200... 20 mins. 683 00:40:46,720 --> 00:40:50,760 Basically, unless you find a way to override your air fryer 684 00:40:50,760 --> 00:40:54,720 and get it to some seriously hot temperatures, or just, you know, 685 00:40:54,720 --> 00:40:57,600 explode it, you should be fine, 686 00:40:57,600 --> 00:41:00,200 because it's only under these extreme conditions 687 00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:01,880 that the more harmful chemicals 688 00:41:01,880 --> 00:41:04,800 used in the making of non-stick coatings are released. 689 00:41:04,800 --> 00:41:07,480 But that is not the end of the story, 690 00:41:07,480 --> 00:41:11,760 because the making of Teflon is still problematic. 691 00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:16,200 We realised that the chemistry out of which PTFE is made 692 00:41:16,200 --> 00:41:19,480 is actually ever living in an environment. 693 00:41:19,480 --> 00:41:23,120 So this is the forever chemicals that people talk about. 694 00:41:23,120 --> 00:41:27,960 When the chemicals used to make PTFE get into our water systems and soil, 695 00:41:27,960 --> 00:41:30,920 they've been linked to health problems like decreased fertility 696 00:41:30,920 --> 00:41:35,920 and cancer, so much so the EU is considering 697 00:41:35,920 --> 00:41:38,960 banning the manufacturing of PTFE. 698 00:41:38,960 --> 00:41:43,600 The direction is to introduce a ban, timeline somewhere from 2027. 699 00:41:43,600 --> 00:41:47,160 And so that includes all of the sort of PTFE Teflon coatings. 700 00:41:47,160 --> 00:41:51,760 More than that, all cable insulations, greases, electronics, 701 00:41:51,760 --> 00:41:54,520 everywhere where you want to use the substance 702 00:41:54,520 --> 00:41:56,880 that actually repels liquids. 703 00:41:56,880 --> 00:42:00,880 So Ted and the team are already looking into alternatives. 704 00:42:00,880 --> 00:42:04,000 His front runner is a new type of ceramic coating, 705 00:42:04,000 --> 00:42:06,480 the recipe of which is top secret. 706 00:42:07,800 --> 00:42:12,440 We strive that you actually get the same properties as for the user 707 00:42:12,440 --> 00:42:15,680 as you would with a PTFE coating. 708 00:42:15,680 --> 00:42:20,640 We will need to wait to see which non-stick ideas stick. 709 00:42:20,640 --> 00:42:25,000 But for now, the research tells us we are safe to fry with PTFE. 710 00:42:29,360 --> 00:42:33,200 Our next component has totally transformed the way we live, 711 00:42:33,200 --> 00:42:36,800 and without it, there would be no air fryer at all, 712 00:42:36,800 --> 00:42:39,960 or, well, any other electrical appliance, for that matter. 713 00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:45,680 I'm talking about the three pinned hero that gives our air fryer life. 714 00:42:45,680 --> 00:42:47,600 It's the plug. 715 00:42:52,200 --> 00:42:57,080 Our kitchen countertops are already pretty packed, so a lot of us 716 00:42:57,080 --> 00:43:00,840 keep our air fryers tucked away when they're not being used. 717 00:43:00,840 --> 00:43:04,000 And the reason why that is possible is because of 718 00:43:04,000 --> 00:43:08,440 the humble British plug, specifically the BS 1363. 719 00:43:08,440 --> 00:43:11,640 Now, doesn't get a lot of attention, this guy. 720 00:43:11,640 --> 00:43:14,640 But over the next three minutes, I hope to persuade you 721 00:43:14,640 --> 00:43:17,880 that this is a genuine genius invention. 722 00:43:17,880 --> 00:43:21,680 To get to grips with the UK plug's unique engineering, 723 00:43:21,680 --> 00:43:24,080 let's get inside. 724 00:43:24,080 --> 00:43:25,400 Well, you've got a fuse there. 725 00:43:25,400 --> 00:43:28,200 You've got two wires, live and neutral, 726 00:43:28,200 --> 00:43:31,240 that are essentially closing the circuit, 727 00:43:31,240 --> 00:43:35,560 so that electricity will flow into and out of your electrical device. 728 00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:38,840 I have an esteemed friend and colleague 729 00:43:38,840 --> 00:43:41,680 who says the live is brown, because that's the colour 730 00:43:41,680 --> 00:43:44,840 your pants will be if you accidentally touch it. 731 00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:47,880 But the clever bit is this third wire up the top, 732 00:43:47,880 --> 00:43:52,400 the green and yellow one. This is your earth wire. 733 00:43:52,400 --> 00:43:57,000 This is the wire that allows the electricity an easy way to escape, 734 00:43:57,000 --> 00:44:02,400 should anything ever go wrong, so you don't get electrocuted. 735 00:44:02,400 --> 00:44:05,920 And the plug has been designed to put that earth wire 736 00:44:05,920 --> 00:44:07,680 front and centre. 737 00:44:07,680 --> 00:44:10,560 I don't know if you've ever noticed this, but the top pin, 738 00:44:10,560 --> 00:44:12,560 the special third pin, 739 00:44:12,560 --> 00:44:16,440 this pin is ever so slightly longer than the others. 740 00:44:16,440 --> 00:44:20,200 That long earth prong goes into the wall first, 741 00:44:20,200 --> 00:44:23,760 so that your plug is earthed before it ever becomes live. 742 00:44:25,280 --> 00:44:30,120 An abracadabra opens up a magic plug portal. 743 00:44:30,120 --> 00:44:33,840 You see, the entrances to the live and the neutral points are protected 744 00:44:33,840 --> 00:44:35,880 by these little gates. 745 00:44:35,880 --> 00:44:38,240 So even if you sort of try and poke a pencil in there, 746 00:44:38,240 --> 00:44:40,200 you're not going to be able to get to them. 747 00:44:40,200 --> 00:44:44,800 This gate gets in the way, and that gate is only opened... 748 00:44:46,280 --> 00:44:48,720 ..when the top pin pushes through. 749 00:44:48,720 --> 00:44:52,400 And then, just a little spring allows that gate to open. 750 00:44:52,400 --> 00:44:54,000 Do you see that? 751 00:44:54,000 --> 00:44:59,280 Very, very clever. Extremely clever idea. 752 00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:03,160 And thus ends my shameless plug for the British plug. 753 00:45:04,840 --> 00:45:07,760 To find out how we got the super-safe British plug, 754 00:45:07,760 --> 00:45:10,880 we need to go back to a perilous time when our homes 755 00:45:10,880 --> 00:45:13,680 were basically electrical minefields. 756 00:45:17,520 --> 00:45:21,880 It's the 1880s, and some lucky ducks, 757 00:45:21,880 --> 00:45:25,920 or rich fat cats, were getting hooked up with electricity 758 00:45:25,920 --> 00:45:27,080 in their homes. 759 00:45:27,080 --> 00:45:30,520 TV ANNOUNCEMENT: This was the beginning of widespread use 760 00:45:30,520 --> 00:45:32,080 of electricity. 761 00:45:32,080 --> 00:45:35,200 But those first fancy electrical appliances had to be 762 00:45:35,200 --> 00:45:37,880 screwed into the light socket for power. 763 00:45:40,600 --> 00:45:44,120 The downside of dangerously daisy-chaining cables 764 00:45:44,120 --> 00:45:48,560 from the ceiling were some serious electrical shocks 765 00:45:48,560 --> 00:45:51,040 and occasionally, you know, death. 766 00:45:56,200 --> 00:45:59,920 To try and make things safer, various inventors came up with 767 00:45:59,920 --> 00:46:02,800 new plug designs for the walls or lights. 768 00:46:02,800 --> 00:46:05,040 But that meant, by the early 20th century, 769 00:46:05,040 --> 00:46:07,640 there were a load of competing plug styles, 770 00:46:07,640 --> 00:46:11,840 and electrical incidents were still shockingly frequent. 771 00:46:14,400 --> 00:46:19,560 It would take a courageous female engineer to finally sort out 772 00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:21,120 this safety nightmare. 773 00:46:24,600 --> 00:46:26,600 Oh, my... 774 00:46:26,600 --> 00:46:28,560 Look at her, right at the front! 775 00:46:28,560 --> 00:46:31,360 It doesn't look like a particularly fun party, let's be honest. 776 00:46:31,360 --> 00:46:36,280 I mean, at least 20 men, and then one absolute badass 777 00:46:36,280 --> 00:46:38,800 sat right in the middle. 778 00:46:38,800 --> 00:46:43,680 Allow me to introduce you to a feminist engineering icon, 779 00:46:43,680 --> 00:46:46,680 Caroline Haslett. Here she is. 780 00:46:46,680 --> 00:46:51,080 Now, back in 1925, when electricity was still kind of 781 00:46:51,080 --> 00:46:53,320 quite a new thing, really, 782 00:46:53,320 --> 00:46:57,320 she was this young, inspired electrical engineer. 783 00:46:57,320 --> 00:47:01,520 And she managed to buy herself a swanky new flat in Marylebone, 784 00:47:01,520 --> 00:47:06,200 and she decided that she was going to install the electricity herself. 785 00:47:06,200 --> 00:47:12,200 This was not the go-to pastime of your average 1920s gal about town, 786 00:47:12,200 --> 00:47:16,040 but Caroline was anything but average. 787 00:47:16,040 --> 00:47:19,640 She strongly believed that the new-fangled electrical appliances 788 00:47:19,640 --> 00:47:22,080 of the day could transform women's lives 789 00:47:22,080 --> 00:47:26,320 by freeing them from the horror of household chores. 790 00:47:26,320 --> 00:47:29,680 The thing is, around this time, people were pretty confused 791 00:47:29,680 --> 00:47:32,560 about electricity, and understandably so, 792 00:47:32,560 --> 00:47:37,040 because some plugs would have three pins, others would have two. 793 00:47:37,040 --> 00:47:39,360 This one here I think is made of wood. 794 00:47:39,360 --> 00:47:42,520 Seems like a slight dangerous idea. 795 00:47:42,520 --> 00:47:46,160 And, I mean, look at the absolute monstrosities that were available. 796 00:47:46,160 --> 00:47:49,880 I'm not sure how you're supposed to comfort yourself nice and warm 797 00:47:49,880 --> 00:47:52,840 while you're sat next to a plug socket in the wall. 798 00:47:52,840 --> 00:47:55,560 But, Caroline, she wanted to change all this, so she set up 799 00:47:55,560 --> 00:47:59,960 the Electrical Association for Women with the amazing slogan 800 00:47:59,960 --> 00:48:02,200 "emancipation from drudgery." 801 00:48:02,200 --> 00:48:07,280 And then she spent two decades encouraging women to get on board 802 00:48:07,280 --> 00:48:08,960 with the electrical revolution... 803 00:48:10,520 --> 00:48:14,520 ..which brings us to the aftermath of World War II. 804 00:48:14,520 --> 00:48:18,760 The mammoth job of rebuilding Britain offered a golden opportunity 805 00:48:18,760 --> 00:48:22,880 to redesign our dodgy electrical system. 806 00:48:22,880 --> 00:48:26,120 So the government formed a committee of mechanical engineers 807 00:48:26,120 --> 00:48:30,560 and appointed Caroline as the safety expert and, you guessed it, 808 00:48:30,560 --> 00:48:31,920 the sole woman. 809 00:48:33,560 --> 00:48:37,160 So they spent an entire month plugging away, 810 00:48:37,160 --> 00:48:40,880 and came up with this thing here, the so-called 811 00:48:40,880 --> 00:48:46,320 Electrical Installations, Post-War Building Studies, Number 11. 812 00:48:46,320 --> 00:48:48,240 Very catchy. 813 00:48:48,240 --> 00:48:52,960 Within its many pages was something Caroline had really pushed for, 814 00:48:52,960 --> 00:48:55,560 a safer universal plug. 815 00:48:55,560 --> 00:49:00,720 Now, before this point, every single electrical item had to be separately 816 00:49:00,720 --> 00:49:03,080 wired into a fuse in the wall, 817 00:49:03,080 --> 00:49:06,800 but by putting the fuse inside the plug, 818 00:49:06,800 --> 00:49:12,160 it meant that if anything dodgy, like a extremely terrifying electric 819 00:49:12,160 --> 00:49:17,560 hot water bottle, if anything dodgy failed, then it would be the plug 820 00:49:17,560 --> 00:49:19,080 that would bear the brunt of it, 821 00:49:19,080 --> 00:49:21,800 rather than blowing the electrics in your whole house. 822 00:49:23,000 --> 00:49:26,120 In 1947, the now iconic three-pin model 823 00:49:26,120 --> 00:49:30,480 became the standard British plug, and the same year, 824 00:49:30,480 --> 00:49:34,680 Caroline was made a dame for her electrifying work. 825 00:49:34,680 --> 00:49:39,160 This might have been a product of post-war design, but the thing is, 826 00:49:39,160 --> 00:49:44,520 this has remained pretty much unchanged for the last 80-odd years 827 00:49:44,520 --> 00:49:47,000 or so, and I think that is a testament 828 00:49:47,000 --> 00:49:50,000 to its simplicity and perfection. 829 00:49:51,680 --> 00:49:54,600 Today's plug may be perfectly formed, 830 00:49:54,600 --> 00:49:57,520 but perhaps not always perfect in practice. 831 00:49:57,520 --> 00:50:00,720 They do occasionally have the capacity to drive you, 832 00:50:00,720 --> 00:50:06,360 well, up the wall, so you may not feel too bad about the fact 833 00:50:06,360 --> 00:50:10,320 that back in the Netherlands, someone is actually being paid 834 00:50:10,320 --> 00:50:12,080 to punish plugs. 835 00:50:13,320 --> 00:50:16,200 Do you ever test it to its limit? Do you ever, like, really load up? 836 00:50:16,200 --> 00:50:18,920 Yeah, we'll keep doing it till failure sometimes. 837 00:50:18,920 --> 00:50:24,320 That is Imogen Adams, engineer and low-key plug torturer. 838 00:50:24,320 --> 00:50:27,880 She twists, rips, and pulls your plugs to make sure 839 00:50:27,880 --> 00:50:30,800 they can withstand everything you throw at them. 840 00:50:30,800 --> 00:50:32,920 Why is this relevant for an air fryer? 841 00:50:32,920 --> 00:50:37,400 So in your kitchen, you might not have that much countertop space. 842 00:50:37,400 --> 00:50:40,400 That also means that you might be unplugging and plugging a lot. 843 00:50:40,400 --> 00:50:43,040 Yanking it accidentally. Yeah, or tripping over, 844 00:50:43,040 --> 00:50:45,080 Sure. I have definitely done that before. 845 00:50:45,080 --> 00:50:48,760 So we want to really make sure that these are as safe as possible. 846 00:50:48,760 --> 00:50:52,840 But Imogen and the team are looking into making this brutal air fryer 847 00:50:52,840 --> 00:50:55,360 plug treatment a thing of the past. 848 00:50:56,840 --> 00:50:59,840 So here we have a new prototype we've been working on, 849 00:50:59,840 --> 00:51:02,960 and it's actually cordless. 850 00:51:02,960 --> 00:51:05,960 Hold on, sorry. It doesn't have a plug at all? 851 00:51:05,960 --> 00:51:07,720 No. You can lift it up. 852 00:51:09,080 --> 00:51:11,960 And it's not battery powered? It's not battery powered at all. 853 00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:13,840 I promise. 854 00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:13,840 MOTOR SWITCHES OFF 855 00:51:13,840 --> 00:51:16,600 Did you hear it turn off? That's hilarious. 856 00:51:20,240 --> 00:51:21,800 BEEPS 857 00:51:20,240 --> 00:51:21,800 Yeah. 858 00:51:21,800 --> 00:51:25,040 Then it works again, and we can cook our food in it again. 859 00:51:25,040 --> 00:51:27,000 That is very cool! 860 00:51:28,480 --> 00:51:32,200 Instead of your appliances all vying for socket space, 861 00:51:32,200 --> 00:51:36,040 Imogen's aim is to make them all completely cordless. 862 00:51:37,200 --> 00:51:39,480 You know, like, when you charge your phone wirelessly... Yeah. 863 00:51:39,480 --> 00:51:41,560 ..is this, like, a big version? 864 00:51:41,560 --> 00:51:45,520 Exactly. So it's working in principle in the same way, 865 00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:48,360 just with the wireless power transfer, 866 00:51:48,360 --> 00:51:52,560 so we have embedded inside the workbench 867 00:51:52,560 --> 00:51:57,040 some transmitter coils, like here. Mm-hm. 868 00:51:57,040 --> 00:51:59,920 So what is this? Just a coil with electricity going through it? 869 00:51:59,920 --> 00:52:03,680 Pretty much, so the transmitter's hooked up to a power source 870 00:52:03,680 --> 00:52:07,240 or a battery we have here. OK. And then we have a receiver. 871 00:52:07,240 --> 00:52:10,720 And then when the power is going through the transmitter, 872 00:52:10,720 --> 00:52:15,080 it creates an electromagnetic field that then the receiver can pick up. 873 00:52:15,080 --> 00:52:17,000 Show me. 874 00:52:15,080 --> 00:52:17,000 SHE GASPS 875 00:52:18,400 --> 00:52:22,000 It's like magic, except it's just physics! Yeah! 876 00:52:22,000 --> 00:52:23,640 Science is cool. 877 00:52:23,640 --> 00:52:27,400 OK, so it wouldn't be an entirely plugless utopia. 878 00:52:27,400 --> 00:52:31,000 You would still need one sneaky plug to power your countertop, 879 00:52:31,000 --> 00:52:35,440 but it would make for a cleaner, clearer work surface. 880 00:52:35,440 --> 00:52:37,680 Is there going to be a point in the future where I can just 881 00:52:37,680 --> 00:52:39,400 pop down an air fryer and pop down my phone 882 00:52:39,400 --> 00:52:40,600 and pop down whatever else? 883 00:52:40,600 --> 00:52:44,760 Yeah. Each device can talk to the transmitter and the receiver, 884 00:52:44,760 --> 00:52:47,280 and they can say, "I need this much power." 885 00:52:47,280 --> 00:52:50,680 So you could put a blender on, which might need less power 886 00:52:50,680 --> 00:52:52,200 than your air fryer. 887 00:52:52,200 --> 00:52:56,360 The team here are just in the early stages of development. 888 00:52:58,320 --> 00:53:00,520 Oh, hello! Oh, do you know what? That looks... 889 00:53:00,520 --> 00:53:02,360 That looks pretty perfect. That... 890 00:53:02,360 --> 00:53:05,440 I mean, there's a slight smell of prototype. 891 00:53:05,440 --> 00:53:08,520 Yeah. That comes... It comes in R&D. 892 00:53:08,520 --> 00:53:12,320 We're not going to eat this, but... No, but no wires, though! 893 00:53:12,320 --> 00:53:14,240 And it's not just air fryers. 894 00:53:14,240 --> 00:53:17,400 The entire wireless charging market is predicted to rise 895 00:53:17,400 --> 00:53:20,440 by over $30 billion by 2030. 896 00:53:22,320 --> 00:53:24,480 In just a decade and a half, 897 00:53:24,480 --> 00:53:29,240 air fryers have changed the cooking game, but the next big breakthrough 898 00:53:29,240 --> 00:53:33,640 might mean you can do dinner without even lifting a finger, 899 00:53:33,640 --> 00:53:38,640 because the future is an all-seeing, all-sensing frying machine. 900 00:53:40,600 --> 00:53:43,320 I like to keep up with the latest inventions on Blue Peter, 901 00:53:43,320 --> 00:53:46,120 and I've got something here that may well turn out to be 902 00:53:46,120 --> 00:53:47,520 the kitchen of the future. 903 00:53:53,760 --> 00:53:57,520 For years, we have been promised futuristic kitchens... 904 00:53:58,520 --> 00:54:02,960 A magnetic field, not magic, keeps the frying pan in air 905 00:54:02,960 --> 00:54:04,680 and breakfast cooking. 906 00:54:06,680 --> 00:54:10,600 ..and high-tech devices designed to deliver us from the drudgery 907 00:54:10,600 --> 00:54:12,480 of everyday dinner making. 908 00:54:14,200 --> 00:54:17,640 I'm back at Versuni, where they're working on the air fryer 909 00:54:17,640 --> 00:54:19,000 of the future. 910 00:54:19,000 --> 00:54:21,360 You're the one who gets to come up with the crazy ideas 911 00:54:21,360 --> 00:54:23,880 and see if they're possible. Yes, yes. 912 00:54:23,880 --> 00:54:28,920 That's Shanghai-based engineer and high frier Winnie Sun. 913 00:54:28,920 --> 00:54:32,360 I'm working to develop a smart air fryer 914 00:54:32,360 --> 00:54:35,520 with computer vision integration. 915 00:54:35,520 --> 00:54:39,560 Winnie has spent two years cooking up a new AI powered, 916 00:54:39,560 --> 00:54:42,200 camera-wielding air fryer. 917 00:54:42,200 --> 00:54:45,080 So, basically, she's given it eyes and a brain. 918 00:54:47,480 --> 00:54:51,840 So the air fryer works out how to cook the food for you? 919 00:54:51,840 --> 00:54:58,280 Yes. So your air fryer can recognise the food you place inside, 920 00:54:58,280 --> 00:55:02,040 you will show the algorithm many pictures. 921 00:55:02,040 --> 00:55:06,840 For example, the apples or oranges, bananas, 922 00:55:06,840 --> 00:55:08,840 and then it will learn. 923 00:55:10,640 --> 00:55:15,200 Don't let Winnie's easy-peasy AI-squeezy tone fool you. 924 00:55:15,200 --> 00:55:19,680 This is fiendishly clever tech that doesn't just identify the food, 925 00:55:19,680 --> 00:55:22,680 it learns how best to cook it. 926 00:55:22,680 --> 00:55:28,080 It will constantly monitor the whole processes so that it can accordingly 927 00:55:28,080 --> 00:55:33,160 adjust temperature and time as needed for a best cooking results. 928 00:55:36,480 --> 00:55:39,600 But for the air fryer to really understand cooking, 929 00:55:39,600 --> 00:55:41,320 that's no picnic. 930 00:55:41,320 --> 00:55:43,800 There are just so many varieties. 931 00:55:43,800 --> 00:55:46,840 For example, fries or potatoes. 932 00:55:46,840 --> 00:55:52,760 You have such straight cut shape and you also have slice and cubes. 933 00:55:53,960 --> 00:55:58,160 Which means Winnie has had to feed this greedy guts algorithm 934 00:55:58,160 --> 00:56:00,800 every possible food shape as well as type, 935 00:56:00,800 --> 00:56:03,560 so it can learn exactly what you like. 936 00:56:06,920 --> 00:56:12,200 It's really like having a private chef at your service. 937 00:56:14,040 --> 00:56:15,920 Look, it sounds great, 938 00:56:15,920 --> 00:56:19,680 but am I just being sucked in by another pie in the sky prototype 939 00:56:19,680 --> 00:56:22,080 that will never actually make it onto the shelves? 940 00:56:22,080 --> 00:56:27,760 How long until we see AI cooking coming to air fryers? 941 00:56:27,760 --> 00:56:30,200 In our next generation. 942 00:56:30,200 --> 00:56:32,960 A couple of years. Really? Yeah. 943 00:56:35,600 --> 00:56:38,720 Air fryers have only been with us for 15 years, 944 00:56:38,720 --> 00:56:42,160 but they really have changed the cooking game, 945 00:56:42,160 --> 00:56:45,600 so who knows what things will look like in the next 15? 946 00:56:45,600 --> 00:56:47,080 Oh! 947 00:56:47,080 --> 00:56:51,000 And maybe an AI device holds the key to my culinary prowess. 948 00:56:51,000 --> 00:56:52,920 Finally. 949 00:56:52,920 --> 00:56:55,600 Initially, I was a little bit reluctant to do an episode 950 00:56:55,600 --> 00:56:57,880 on air fryers just because there's so much hype about them, 951 00:56:57,880 --> 00:57:00,800 and I sort of didn't want to jump on the train. 952 00:57:00,800 --> 00:57:05,040 But, you know, now I am quite fond of them because I think, 953 00:57:05,040 --> 00:57:10,480 in here, there is over 100 years of scientific innovation. 954 00:57:10,480 --> 00:57:13,760 There's countless people who have been inventing 955 00:57:13,760 --> 00:57:16,520 with the sole purpose of making our domestic life 956 00:57:16,520 --> 00:57:18,160 just that little bit easier. 957 00:57:18,160 --> 00:57:20,480 So you know what? I think these little ovens 958 00:57:20,480 --> 00:57:23,080 probably do deserve a place on our countertops. 959 00:57:25,240 --> 00:57:26,520 Next time... 960 00:57:26,520 --> 00:57:28,120 Whoa, whoa! 961 00:57:28,120 --> 00:57:30,160 ..it's the fridge. 962 00:57:30,160 --> 00:57:33,120 Unless you are a refrigeration aficionado, 963 00:57:33,120 --> 00:57:35,560 it probably doesn't get a second thought. 964 00:57:35,560 --> 00:57:38,520 But it's the story of an explosive invention... 965 00:57:38,520 --> 00:57:42,520 He almost blows himself up a couple of times, but it was worth it. 966 00:57:42,520 --> 00:57:44,960 I feel like we're sort of matching. 967 00:57:44,960 --> 00:57:47,920 ..a chicken incubator and a revelation... 968 00:57:47,920 --> 00:57:49,480 The problem is serious. 969 00:57:49,480 --> 00:57:52,000 ..that set fridges against the world. 970 00:57:54,480 --> 00:57:57,480 The Open University has produced a free poster 971 00:57:57,480 --> 00:58:01,640 exploring what lies behind the genius of some everyday objects. 972 00:58:01,640 --> 00:58:04,880 To order a copy, call... 973 00:58:07,000 --> 00:58:09,640 ..scan the QR code, or go to... 974 00:58:12,320 --> 00:58:15,520 ..and follow the links to the Open University.