The tank is able to hold at-least 7.5 to 8 liters of oil at a safe capacity but we have been pouring much less oil than the optimal capacity based on our needs and once the temperature controller unit is plugged to it and the equipment is powered by electricity, it efficiently heats up the oil and we are able to deep fry various foods of our choice. Till now, we have used it to deep fry Chicken Drumsticks, Chicken Livers, French Fries, Sweet Potato Fries and Banana Fries in this unit at various intervals of times since getting this unit and all of them have turned out really good.
Both the Timer controls and Temperature controls on the control unit are very intelligently designed and the knobs on both of them are tight enough to remain firmly set once set to.
BEST FEATURE 1: Both the Knobs of Timer and Temperature are made of heat insulating materials and during the middle of the operation when the deep frying process is ongoing of food, we noticed that when we touched the knobs to change the timer and temperature during the middle of the operation, they were never ever hot even 1 bit and remained at room temperatures and easy to touch and control without fear of burning our fingers which we were initially concerned about but worked out just fine.
BEST FEATURE 2: There are RED and YELLOW lights activated for Timer and Temperature controls respectively which help big time to turn on/off to respectively control them and this feature in particular helps big time when we want to step away for a bit while deep frying of food is in progress as it auto completes the deep frying task using these controls and in turn helps to prevent any potential hazards or burn injury to any of us. The thermostat knob in particular has an excellent temperature control range of upto 375 F which is pretty high range for us to get those crispy fries and chicken.
BEST FEATURE 3: The basket and the lid (night cover) are very meticulously designed such that the basket can be lifted up after the food is deep fried and hanged onto the top of the tank exactly at a spot where it is just above the optimal oil level of the tank which helps big time to drip the excess oil from the food inside the basket back into the tank and then the lid fits the tank perfectly when food is being deep friend to prevent any contamination entering food. The lid has cut-outs on both sides perfectly aligned for heat and excess vapor to release out of it and avoid any over heat and over frying situation and also acts as a night cover to close the tank after it is cleaned.
BEST FEATURE 4: And then we also were super impressed with the safely reset switch provided on the back of the unit which we noticed automatically got activated when temperature was too high and what it did was it automatically cut off power to this unit and prevented any potential mishaps.
The disassembly of this unit once the deep frying task is not too hard either when we need to clean the basket, lid and other parts of this unit.
While overall this deep fryer is definitely a great bang for the buck, we felt 2 specific improvement areas which I will document below:
Improvement Area 1: On the all 4 sides of the deep fryer there is no heat insulation of any sort provided at all, not even some strip so because of this, after the deep frying of food activity is done, we have to wait for a fair amount of time for the tank to get cool down before we can even bother to touch it or lift it to clean it. It would had been better and ideal if the manufacturer had installed a heat insulation strip or some sort of a heat insulating handle using which it can be lifted immediately after the power was cut and job was done of deep frying.
Improvement Area 2: The equipment is very heavy and not too easy to move especially when filled with oil and while this speaks volumes about the quality of the strong stainless steel used to manufacture it, it sometimes may be difficult for elderly people to maneuver with it to lift it especially for cleaning purpose. In my recommendation, an alternate lighter metal may be used in future generation of this product which may make it slightly lighter by reducing its weight.
Other than these few recommendations above, this deep frying unit aces the job of getting us some hot and crispy deep fried snacks including both vegetarian and non-vegetarian options and due to its intelligently designed features, this is going to be a long lasting equipment in our kitchen and will our kitchen ally for a long time ahead. Top find here and has my family's approval.