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The Guardian
33 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Air fryer, slushie maker, food processor, two blenders … is my Ninja kitchen appliance habit out of control?
I have a problem. It has spanned many years, cost me hundreds of pounds and earned the derision – and concern – of friends and family. Don't worry: it isn't anything sordid but it does give me an absurd number of ways to cook chicken or use up a bag of potatoes. My poison is Ninja appliances. Anyone who walks into my tiny kitchen is taken aback by my extensive collection. My prized trio are the Foodi, the Foodi Max Health Grill and Air Fryer and the Creami, which collectively give me the ability to air-fry, grill, sear, roast, pressure-cook, slow-cook, steam or even dehydrate my dinner, and transform a frozen mishmash of protein powder, yoghurt and sweeteners into an ice-cream-like dessert. It doesn't stop there. I also own a Ninja blender, food processor and hand blender. While less flashy, they have survived my unwise attempts to mince a fully intact topside of beef and turn avocado stones into 'detox dust' for an ill-fated 'glow-up' smoothie. I am far from the only person who has been taken in by Ninja fever. Global sales of its products reached almost $2.9bn in 2024, a 38% jump from nearly $2.1bn the year before. With more than 50 Ninja kitchen products available in Britain, the UK is now the second largest market for their maker, the US-based appliance company SharkNinja. It is a remarkable feat considering that a decade ago the brand was nearly unknown in the UK. It was the air fryer that changed that, particularly the two-drawer food crisper, which hit the shops in 2020. Launching at £179.99 in the UK ($179.99 in the US), it was swiftly stocked in high-street big hitters including Argos and John Lewis. It soon took the UK, and the world, by storm. In 2023, John Lewis named the Ninja air fryer as one of its 'products of the decade'. On Amazon, Ninja's products dominate the air-fryer bestsellers charts, holding four of the top five spots in the UK and the US. Ninja's next mega-success was the Creami, which promises to turn a tub filled with ingredients of your choosing into a creamy, cold dessert. It launched in 2021 in the US at $179.99 and soon became a viral hit on social media. By 2022, Ninja claimed it was America's 'No 1 ice-cream maker', based on sales data from market research firm NPD Group. On TikTok, the hashtag '#ninjacreami' has 244m views as people have flocked to the platform to show off their recipes. Strained yoghurt and fruits are common options, but others have opted for more off-piste creations, including a baked bean 'ice-cream'. The Ninja Slushi (£349.99 in the UK, $349.99 in the US), which allows you to make slushies and cocktails at home, is the brand's latest success, selling out 15 times on its release in the US. On the back of that hit, SharkNinja was this year named as one of Time Magazine's top 100 companies, joining the likes of Netflix and Amazon. The brand has also done a remarkable job of getting A-listers to plug its products. Kris Jenner's Instagram featured a sponsored post of her singing the device's praises. David Beckham is a global brand ambassador for Ninja and in one advert showed off some of his own culinary quirks – which included using his Ninja Double Stack air fryer (£229.99) to cook carrots whole, including the green tops, and using the Woodfire outdoor oven (£349.99), which triples up as an oven, pizza oven and BBQ smoker, inside his kitchen. Viewers of the film F1: The Movie, starring Brad Pitt, will see SharkNinja's product placement throughout – from its logo stamped on race cars to Ninja gadgets on show in swanky kitchens. In an interview with Ad Week in March, SharkNinja CEO Mark Barrocas said the company spends much of its $700m advertising budget on social media. Influencers play such a strong role in promoting the Creami, he said: 'We virtually don't invest any more advertising on [it].' The company has also worked hard to get its products in the hands of so-called 'microinfluencers' who have 'great, authentic followings with smaller niche groups'. It is, simply, word of mouth for the social media age. But this kind of business relies on innovation. SharkNinja pours money into research and development, with a budget that rose to $341.3m in 2024, up 37% from 2023. It has a team of more than 1,100 engineers and designers in the UK, US and China, is typically working on 60 products at any one time and launches about 25 new products a year. Some of these are better value than others, according to Natalie Hitchins, head of home products and services at Which? 'Ninja continues to be a popular brand with customers, and when it comes to air fryers, blenders and multicookers, our testing has found that this is mostly well deserved,' she says. 'However, prices can reach more than £300 so it certainly isn't the cheapest. And if you're looking for an ice-cream maker or mini-oven, we've found that there are other brands that perform better and cost less, so it's worth looking elsewhere.' Like me, Rhianne Crozier has a kitchen full of Ninja appliances. Her love of the brand started six years ago. After she moved into her new home with her husband, her parents gave her a Ninja air fryer as housewarming gift. Now she owns more than 10 Ninja gadgets. They include the Creami, Slushi, the Luxe Café coffee machine (£549.99) – a high-end brewer that allows you to make espressos, cold brews and cafe staples such as lattes and cappuccinos – and the Ninja Speedi multicooker (£229.99), a combined steamer and air fryer designed for one-pot meals. In total, she has spent about £2,000 on Ninja products. The 28-year-old content creator, who shows off her dishes on TikTok under the name Home With Rhianne, has two children. 'I've cooked meals in about 15 minutes. It's great when you've got hungry kids,' she says. 'Before I would stay in the kitchen for hours.' She hasn't touched her pans or oven in months. 'It's more convenient to just put it in, close it, take it out. They're easy to clean afterwards too,' she says. But does the success of Ninja tell us something more uncomfortable about how we live today? Pen Vogler, author of Scoff: A History of Food and Class in Britain, says 'these very speedy innovations' are part of a consumer culture where 'there has to be something new constantly'. My personal journey into Ninja-obsession did start with need. When I moved into my small flat, it was unfurnished. After buying something to sleep on (my bed) and something to watch (my TV), money was too tight to deck out my kitchen with pots, pans and baking trays. Instead, I opted for a Ninja Foodi, which set me back just over £100. It allowed me to sear, pressure-cook and air-fry my food without having to buy loads of extra equipment, and it was much quicker than using the oven. I'm not the only person who struggles for space – one study by the University of Reading found that the living space of the average private renter in Britain shrank from 31 sq metres in 1996 to 25 sq metres in 2017; and families are renting increasingly smaller homes as the cost of living soars. Vogler says that in the Victorian era, living space was also very tight, and cooking gadgets were also enormously popular. She points to Charles Dickens, who in his 1841 novel The Old Curiosity Shop described a silver 'temple' with four chambers. In one, an egg was placed and in another, some coffee was poured. Raw steak and water were put in and, after the machine worked its magic, 'breakfast was ready'. It is, says Vogler, 'like a kind of Victorian air fryer'. A lack of living space means people will 'try to use what technology they have available to answer the problems of how to cook. What Ninja is doing now is just a continuation of something that has been happening for centuries. Technology comes along and it finds a solution to our domestic problems.' What started for me as a solution to a space problem soon became something else. I became obsessed with the Ninja brand, eagerly following its social media to see what device it could bring out to tempt me with next. Recently, however, the shine has worn off. While the Slushi has been a sensation, it lacks many things that have previously sold me on the brand. Yes, it allows you to make slushie drinks and cocktails, but there are major setbacks. It takes at least half an hour to produce a drink, lacks that 'I can see myself using this every day' factor and, most importantly, doesn't seem to have many health advantages, as sugar must be used for most drinks to work in the machine. 'Health is becoming a really important part of our cooking technology,' says Vogler. And Ninja's success has certainly played on our worries about ultra-processed foods. 'There's a large element of anxiety around industrial food that is sending people back to try to make it for themselves,' says Vogler, which 'air fryers and kitchen gadgets will do well from. If people are moving back to cooking, they will always want a fast and easy way to do it.' Ninja has adapted to 2020s living, but how have the gadgets changed us? Before the air fryer, there was the microwave. Both have been accused of tarnishing the culinary arts, but Vogler says some of our most beloved dishes were born out of new kitchen technology. For her, the air fryer has an unlikely relative. 'Cast iron ovens first came in about 300 years ago. It was a massive new technology and is also when our era of home-baking took off,' she says. It ushered in some of our favourite dishes, including eccles cakes and baked tarts. Judy Joo, TV chef and owner of the London-based Korean restaurant Seoul Bird, says kitchen gadgets can be 'great', but they have limits. 'Sometimes you just want to cook something the way it was intended,' she says. That includes being able to watch what's going on. With Ninja appliances, particularly the air fryers and multi-cookers, you end up shoving something in a draw or sealing a lid. For Joo, visibility is key. 'You should be able to see food cooking and changing versus something that you say goodbye to and open up the door once it's ready,' she says. 'You lose control of the cooking process.' And, she says, air fryers will never fully replicate something deep-fried, like chicken. 'It's a compromise,' she says. 'You don't get things as crispy. It's crispy-ish, but it's definitely not the same. You could tell the difference 100%.' For her, nothing quite beats the kitchen classics, particularly the satisfaction of 'getting out a regular pot or pan, drizzling oil, hearing the sizzle and cracking an egg'. The humble frying pan is much more versatile than it's given credit for, considering you can 'glaze, simmer and saute' in it, she says. 'You can't deglaze in an air fryer.'
Daily Mail
9 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Trump flags tariff hike that may impact Australia
Australian exporters may be hit with tariffs of up to 20 percent at the US border, after President Donald Trump flagged a hike in the baseline duty for all imports. Trump suggested the minimum tariff for countries that do not negotiate separate trade deals may double. Speaking at a press conference at his luxury golf resort in Turnberry, Scotland on Monday (Tuesday, AEST), the US president said the blanket tariff would affect 'the rest of the world', having secured exemption deals with major economies including Japan and the European Union. Asked what the new rate would be, he said: 'I would say it'll be somewhere in the 15 to 20 percent range. 'Probably one of those two numbers'. The baseline tariff is currently set at 10 percent and is applied to most goods sent to the US by about 200 countries including Australia. Despite mounting pressures on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, his government has been unable to secure an exemption ahead of an August 1 deadline. Shadow Finance Minister James Paterson said the latest announcement exposed the damage caused by Albanese's failure to establish a relationship with Trump, having still not met him face-to-face. The Prime Minister sought to discuss the tariffs with Trump during the G7 summit in Canada last month but the US President left ahead of schedule due to the Israel-Iran conflict. Mr Paterson added it seemed Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd also had no meetings at the White House since Trump was sworn in in January, having previously mocked and criticized the US president. 'I suspect we would know about it if he had, I suspect it would be all over social media if he had, so I think it's a reasonable inference now that there has been no meetings.' For its part, the Albanese government has restated its opposition to the tariffs but downplayed what it said about Australia-US relations. 'We are a country that relies on trade, we are a country with a very high proportion of jobs that rely on trade,' Assistant Treasurer Dan Mulino told Sky News. 'That remains the position of this government. So, we would rather a situation in which the world doesn't go down the path of imposing tariffs. 'But what I can say is that Australia remains in a situation where we've got as good a deal as anybody, and we continue to engage with the US Government intensely on these matters.' A spokesperson for Trade Minister Don Farrell said Australia would continue to engage 'at all levels' to advocate for the removal of the tariffs. 'We, as the opposition, disagree with Trump's tariff policy, but again, it reinforces the urgency and the great disappointment that our prime minister hasn't had a face-to-face meeting with Trump,' he said. 'He needs to go over there and prosecute the case, to argue Australia's case, but also to stand up for free trade across the globe, because the importance of it for us as a trading nation, as Australia.' It comes only days after Australia lifted its ban on importing US beef - eliminating a key reason cited by the Trump administration for its tariff on Aussie goods. Mr Albanese insisted the move was the outcome of a biosecurity review that had been underway for years rather than a backdown in the face of tariffs, but US officials have celebrated it as a win for the president. 'This is yet another example of the kind of market access the president negotiates to bring America into a new golden age of prosperity, with American agriculture leading the way,' US Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins said.
BBC News
9 hours ago
- BBC News
US and China end 'constructive' trade talks without breakthrough
The US and China have wrapped up another round of trade talks without any major breakthroughs, despite discussions that both sides described as "constructive".The negotiations, held in Stockholm, Sweden came as a truce established in May is set to expire next month, threatening to revive the turmoil that hit in April when the two countries exchanged escalating tit-for-tat tariffs. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said any extension of that truce, in which both sides agreed to drop some measures, would be up to President Donald trade negotiator Li Chenggang said that both sides would push to preserve that agreement. Beijing and Washington have been at loggerheads on a range of issues as well as tariffs, including US demands that China's ByteDance sell TikTok and that China speed up its export of critical minerals. Trump started hiking tariffs on Chinese goods shortly after his return to the White House. China ultimately responded with tariffs of its own. Tensions escalated, with tariff rates hitting the triple digits, before a trade truce in left Chinese goods facing an additional 30% tariff compared with the start of the year, with US goods facing a new 10% tariff in China. Without the truce being extended by the 12 August deadline, tariffs could "boomerang" back up, US officials said."Nothing is agreed until we speak with President Trump," Bessent said, while downplaying the risks of escalation."Just to tamp down that rhetoric, the meetings were very constructive. We just haven't given the sign off," he said. This was the the third meeting between the US and China since for the two sides said they discussed each others' economies, implementation of terms previously agreed by Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping and rare earths, a key sticking point because of their importance in new technology including electric vehicles. The US also pressed China on its dealings with Russia and Chenggang said both sides were "fully aware of the importance of safeguarding a stable and sound China-US trade and economic relationship". Bessent said he felt the the US had momentum, after recent agreements that Trump has secured with Japan and the European Union. "I believe they were in more of a mood for wide-ranging discussion," he Trump has long complained about the trade deficit with China, which last year saw the US buy $295bn more goods from China than the other way Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the US was already on track to reduce that gap by $50bn this Bessent said the US was not looking to completely "de-couple"."We just need to de-risk with certain strategic industries, whether it's the rare earths, semiconductors, medicines," he said at a briefing for reporters after the conclusion of the talks.
