Can you cook frozen Pizza in air fryer

Air fryers will make little work of cooking a pizza to how you want it, with a frozen pizza benefiting from the air fryers ability to crisp up the frozen pizza base in a short time.

What the pizza happens to be, fresh or frozen, a classic pizza or pockets and pizza bread, all can be air fried if they fit. And if they don't, such as a too large frozen pizza, it can be cut down to size. Air fry frozen pizza upside down for half the time, to ensure you crisp up what will be an otherwise damp soggy base.

You absolutely can air fry any kind of frozen pizza product in an air fryer, but unfortunately it all comes down to size.

With the small capacity air fryers mostly available on the market today, you wouldn't think it would be possible to air fry any kind of frozen pizza due to size restrictions.

Frozen pizzas made to cook at home are typical 9-10 inches wide, with width of the internal air fryer basket far smaller than that. But there is a plus, that is you can fit smaller size frozen pizzas in an air fryer, with often little space to spare.

What you have to do is ensure the width of your pizza fits inside the basket, and more importantly, make sure the pizza isn't tightly wedged as it will be impossible to remove.

Air fryers can cook frozen pizzas just as well as your oven, with the cooking instructions for the oven carefully followed, but with the time reduced by up to 6-7 minutes.

You can come unstuck when air frying a frozen pizza, like when the cheese melts onto the basket, thus losing your valuable toppings. Which is why its a good idea to always line the air fryer basket in parchment paper - to catch both toppings and melted cheese.

When it comes to finally removing the pizza out of the air fryer, this same parchment paper can be used like a handle, to pull the pizza base up and out.

How I like to air fry any kind of pizza - both fresh and frozen - is to begin air frying the pizza upside down to crisp up the crust; I then flip the pizza over for the remaining half to melt the cheese and cook the top side.

If pizza FITS, you can air fry it

One major hurdle you'll run into when you want to air fry a frozen rounded or square pizza, is whether the pizza fits in your air fryer.

And I will say, 80% of the time, your store-bought frozen pizza won't fit in your air basket, but that is unless you make some changes.

What I mean by that is, you could think about squaring up your frozen pizza, so a rounded pizza is cut in such a way [pictured], that you can make it fit by reducing the width. Don't worry about waste, as these scraps can still be air fried.

Rounded pizza that fits perfectly into a rounded air fryer remember, will be impossible to remove as there's no way to get your fingers, or say tongs, under the pizza to pull out; thus pizza toppings and cheese become a mess in your effort to remove a well fitted pizza crust.

With that in mind, its vitally important to first line your air fryer basket in parchment paper, with wings. So then you can pull out the pizza with use of the access parchment around the edges of the fully cooked pizza.

All this applies to frozen pizzas measuring between 8-10 inches wide, thus frozen mini pizzas and similar pizza products like pizza pockets will fit in any air fryer with ease.

Quickly 'dry out' defrosting pizza

Difference between a fresh and frozen pizza of course, is your frozen pizza has a build up of frozen water, which can cause a soggy mess when air frying a frozen pizza.

What you must do is make sure you get your air fryer nice and hot with a 5 minute preheat, to ensure the melting water is dried up as quickly as possible.

Air fry your frozen pizza like any freshly cooked or reheated pizza, which must begin with a preheat.

I would recommend you air fry a frozen pizza upside down for the first 6-7 minutes, then flip it over for the remaining 6-7 minutes. What this will do is allow the air fryer heating element to crisp up the pizza base, which could otherwise end up soggy if you don't air fry the frozen pizza upside to begin with.

Access defrosting water will dry up in the process of cooking a frozen pizza, and will be safe inside the air fryer, with no danger of smoking or fire.

Frozen pizza will avert flying toppings

Great thing about air frying frozen pizza when compared to a fresh pizza, is that the toppings and cheese are frozen.

What's so great about that is, your frozen pizza toppings and grated cheese are unlikely to fly around inside the air fryer, whilst causing a mess of both pizza and basket.

By the time the air fried pizza is defrosted, the pizza and toppings would of stuck to the pizza base, which will save you the time and trouble of reorganizing your pizza toppings, and scraping the cheese off the sides of the air fryer basket.

Unfortunately, not all frozen pizza toppings will be permanently stuck, with some toppings remaining loose.

Not a problem because for starters you can use this opportunity to evenly spread out the toppings, but do keep an eye on them for the first few moments in the air fryer. They do risk flying about, and could end up getting caught in the heating element located above.

Better yet, because the frozen pizza would ideally be cooking upside down for the first half of cooking time, the loose toppings/cheese can be added to the pizza once the base has been flipped the right way up.

Sit on Parchment to save pizza toppings

Any pizza you intend to cook in the air fryer I believe must always be cook for the first half at least, upside down.

Why that matters is because this gives you the opportunity to crisp up the base.

If you air fry a pizza - and this especially applies to frozen pizzas - the base will remain soggy, and in many cases will be sticky.

What you must do is partially air fry the pizza upside down on parchment paper - so the parchment can catch access toppings and cheese - then flip the pizza with the topping facing up, to use the remaining minutes to crisp up the toppings and cheese.

I will say, air frying any pizza upside down for half of the cooking time will cause the loose toppings and cheese to spill and make a mess. Fortunately, the parchment paper is there to catch access toppings so you can return them to the pizza once you flip it the right way up.

Air fry all pizza-like items

Air frying frozen pizza doesn't just apply to a typical 8-10 inch round or square pizza mind, because you have the opportunity to air fry just about any pizza related product.

Take mini pizzas for a start, you can air fry these small pizzas up to 9 at a time in many cases, although air frying all pizza-like items should be air fried on parchment paper.

In addition, air frying items like frozen pizza rolls is a breeze because these small items are easy to handle. With that, other pizza-like items will include frozen pizza pockets which can all be store-bought or made at home before freezing.

Said pizza-like products will air fry with the same temperature as instructed to for the oven, with the time usually reduced by 5 minutes to account for the speedy time of the air fryer.

Do keep an eye on frozen pizza items like pockets and rolls because you don't want a hard crispy crust, but a light soft crust with a piping hot centre.

And that is where you must keep the air fryer temperature to something like 355°F/180°C for pizza pockets and rolls, as a high temperature will brown/burn the pizza crust before the frozen centre has time to defrost and cook properly.

Summarise

If you can air fry a fresh or reheated pizza, of course you can air fry just about any kind of frozen pizza, that is compatible with your air fryer basket.

What that relates to is, the frozen pizza must easily slide into your air fryer basket so it can be easily pulled out of the hot air fryer once its cooked.

What you will need to do with any frozen pizza especially, is air fry it for half of the cooking time, upside down. Its important to get the pizza base underside nice and crisp to prevent it becoming a soggy mess.

Frozen pizza cooked on the topping-side up only will result in the pizza base being undercooked, and therefore being soggy.

It would be a good idea to place your frozen pizza upside down in your air fryer basket, where it will ideally be positioned on top of parchment paper.

Not only will the parchment paper prevent both toppings and cheese sticking to the basket, the parchment will in fact catch any toppings that will drop on the paper; where you can return said ingredients to the top-side of the pizza once its flipped over halfway.

Loose pizza toppings can fly about in your air fryer which will cause a mess.

What you can do is brush off loose toppings and leave to one side. Once the pizza is half way through air frying and flipped back over, return the still frozen loose toppings to the pizza to allow said toppings/cheese to cook for the remaining minutes.

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