Healthy Air Fryer Baked Salmon
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If you’re craving seafood, this healthy baked salmon doesn’t get easier than this. Air fryer baked salmon in the air fryer is truly a quick and easy dinner. We’re obsessed with air fryer cooking, especially when it comes to seafood.
Watch Video of Air Fried Baked Salmon Recipe
How to Make Healthy Salmon in the Air Fryer?
It’s truly super easy to make salmon in the air fryer without a bunch of fuss. All you need to do is lightly coat the salmon with olive oil, then season with salt and pepper. You barely need any oil or grease at all and that’s what makes cooking salmon in the air fryer so wonderful. The salmon comes out perfect every time. The hot air circulates evenly around the food, giving the food a wonderful crispy texture that’s like roasted without all the oil.
Air fried foods is much healthier too because you don’t need as much oil! That’s the wonderful reason to cook with air fryers. It gives such a great texture similar to deep frying, but with all the greasy oil. There’s less mess too. If you’re frying foods, you have grease to dispose of and mess to clean up. But in the air fryer, you don’t have all those issues and best of all, there’s less odor!
What are the Best Air Fryers?
There’s so many on the market now. You just need to research and find the ones that fits your needs, capacity and style. We group the basket style air fryers into 2 main size groups: 3-4 qt range & the 5-6 qt. range. Here’s our favorites:
Cosori 3.7 qt. Digital Air Fryer – “That’s a stylish Air Fryer” was said as we unboxed the Cosori. Beyond being stylish, it has cooked great. The basket is not as tall and wider than most in its size group, which is perfect. You’ll have a lot better results in an air fryer with single layered, spread out foods, then with ones piled high and thick.
The non-stick basket style (non-wire base) & smoothness of the basket tray is also great for clean up.
Ninja 4 qt. Digital Air Fryer – Has a great ceramic coated basket, one of the longest lasting we’ve used. Super powerful fan that will often cook recipes even faster than other air fryers. We initially returned our first one because we thought we wouldn’t like the basket style. After reconsidering, we bought another and are super glad we did. We love it’s basket and just a platform insert. One less bulky thing to wash. This is a great air fryer.
Good Larger Air Fryers
Tiluxury 5.8 qt. Digital Air Fryer – It’s a good larger air fryer capable of cooking for larger families, especially when you need to cook more food. It’s great for cooking bigger batches (ie 4 salmon fillets instead of 2 or 2 lbs of fries instead of 1).
We like that this Tiluxury 5.8 qt has the non-stick basket (non-wire base). Makes for less sticking for delicate meals (ie baked fish fillets). And we like the digital interface (easier cleaning).
Gourmia 6 qt. Digital Air Fryer – This is quickly becoming one of our favorite larger basket style air fryers. Great basket size, good controls, cooks nice. Clean up is great. It has become one of our kitchen favorites. We’ll often find it as Costco at a great price too!
Here’s More Great Low Fat Air Fryer Recipes
- Crispy Brussels Sprouts with Balsamic Vinegar Recipe – Amazing!
- Homemade Crispy Air Fried French Fries with barely any oil– Wow!
Healthy Air Fryer Baked Salmon
Ingredients
- 2 6 ounce (2 170 g) salmon fillets , skin and bones removed
- 1 teaspoon (5 ml) olive oil or light spray of organic cooking spray
- kosher salt , to taste
- black pepper , to taste
Instructions
- Coat salmon with lightly oil or cooking spray. Season both sides of salmon with salt and pepper.
- Place salmon in basket. Air fry the salmon at 360°F for about 10 minutes or until cooked to your preferred texture.
- Check the salmon with a fork to make sure it's cooked the way you like it.
- Enjoy! It’s that easy.
Notes
Video
Nutrition Information per Serving
Enjoy more of our healthy Salmon Recipes:
- Foil pack garlic salmon
- Garlic parmesan salmon
- Serve salmon with healthy air fryer cauliflower
This air fryer baked salmon recipe was originally published in 2018 and re-published in 2019 with updated video.
19 Comments on “Healthy Air Fryer Baked Salmon”
This was awesome. The salmon had a great crust and was still juicy in the center. Can’t believe it came out of an air fryer. Thanks for the recipe.
Hi Morgan, so glad you enjoyed it! Love the air fryer!
So savory and very easy to do. This is a great way to introduce salmon to my kids.
That’s awesome that your kids are eating healthy salmon!
I just got an air fryer for Christmas and I love it! Have made chicken breasts and lean hamburgers. We want to try salmon in it but I’m worried the exhaust will stink up the whole house. Have you had that happen or does it cook pretty much smoke free? I am anxious to try your recipe. We love the simplicity of it, just salmon and not a lot of extra flavors and calories. Thank you!
Congrats on the new air fryer! There will definitely be a smell so we suggest having the exhaust on high and buying the freshest salmon possible!
This is my second time making this recipe and it’s so quick and easy. Next time I’m going to try tilapia! Any suggestions how timing?
Tilapia is usually little thinner, so cut back the cooking time by about 3 minutes. Then keep checking to make sure it’s to your desired texture. Glad you’re enjoying the recipe!
I barely used any oil and the salmon came out perfect. It’s so much quicker and better than baking it in the oven.
We love baking in the air fryer better than the oven too!
Fantastic recipe and so easy! I added some broccoli and cooked both the salmon and the vegetable together. Instant dinner!
We do the same thing! We like to add cauliflower too and it’s a quick and easy healthy salmon dinner.
You are driving me crazy with all these great air fryer recipes! My salmon came out great and I added some pesto on top. Yum.
I have cooked this 1-2 times per week since I learnt this recipe. Very tasty and well worth the time and effort. I also I like to throw some bok choi in at the last minute to add some green to the meal.
Love this recipe. It cooks the salmon straight through!
Healthier way to cook salmon. And it turns out perfect.