How to Revive Soggy Fast Food in Your Air Fryer

A rainy day makes food delivery more tempting than usual. For me, if I’m ordering anything then it’s probably not pad see ew or a quinoa salad, it’s likely fast food—I have a weakness for fried chicken sandwiches. The trouble is, ordering fried food has a habit of turning the corner really quickly, especially on a rainy day. I’m talking about soggy food, folks, and it’s not pretty. Luckily, there’s help.

There’s a reason I rarely order fast-food delivery, and it’s not because I’m a food writer and recipe developer. That would be perfectly reasonable, but no. It’s the cost. In New York City at least (but everywhere, I’m sure), the price sneaks up on you at the end of your order. If I’ve committed to throwing down $40 on burgers and nuggets then I’d like to eat them at the peak, or damn close to it. 

How to revive your soggy fast food

Air frying can help bring your deeply humidified fast food back from the dead. Waiting 45 minutes just to find that the food is soggy is infuriating, and I know it’s hard to convince you to wait another five to 10, but it’s absolutely worth it. 

Air fryers to consider for your fried food revival needs:

Fried sides are easy

French fries, chicken nuggets, chicken fries, onion rings, and sides like these are by far the easiest to resuscitate. I’m pretty sure the air fryer was created simply to reheat leftover fries, and as a happy accident it heats other stuff, too. Any item that was once deep fried has oil imbued into the outer layer. There’s no need to do anything to these special items. 

Spread the food out in the air fryer basket. Set the machine to 375°F on the “air fry” setting and let it rip for three to five minutes. They reheat with surprising speed, so be sure to check on them after about two minutes and give the basket a shake. They’ve already cooked once; you’re just removing the moisture that’s weighing down the crust.

Divide and conquer sandwiches

Sandwiches are tough. While reheating something like fast food fried chicken is a breeze, sandwiches are glorious compositions of multiple parts. Simply chucking the entire sando in an air fryer can be troublesome—some of those parts cook differently, or aren’t meant to be cooked at all. 

Fried chicken sandwiches

The breading under the tomato is soft and peeling off. Not my favorite.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

You can see in the picture that my fried chicken sandwich had mush-i-fied so completely that the breading was far from crispy—it was bloated and ripping off. I wanted to get the chicken hot and crisp up the outside while not cooking the mayo/lettuce/tomato mess, and gently warm the bun. I decided the best course of action was to perform minor surgery.

Different parts will reheat for different amounts of times, and some not at all.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

Keeping the air fryer at 375°F on the “air fry” setting, I added the chicken patty (scraped free of the lettuce, tomato, and special sauce) and bun halves, cut side up, to the basket. The bun takes only a minute or two to lose the soggy feeling, so you’ll remove those relatively quickly.

Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

The chicken and buns, luckily, have the residual scrapings of mayonnaise. While this might seem like a problem, it’s actually helpful. Mayo is primarily composed of oil, which means it’ll conduct heat well onto the chicken’s crust and help re-crisp it. Same with the bun. Air fry the chicken for five to seven minutes in total, depending on how crispy you like it. 

That’s much better.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

Burgers and cheeseburgers

Burgers heat up much faster than chicken sandwiches (there’s no fried layer on the outside to crisp) but, alas, the cheeseburger presented me with a bit of a problem. The melted cheese congealed in the car ride over to me and because I got a double cheeseburger, both patties were completely, absolutely, and irrevocably attached to their buns. Honestly, I’ve never seen anything like it. One side even had pickles and ketchup involved and still the bond was secure. 

The meat and bun are inseparable. No need to work too hard, just throw it in the air fryer.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

I was able to split the sandwich in half, the burgers parted from each other peacefully, but it was impossible to take off the bread without destroying it. In order to best protect the bread from drying out, I placed the open-faced burger pieces meat-side up and air fried them for two minutes. Since my basket-style air fryer only heats from the top (where the heating element and fan are located) the meat patty sizzled while the bun underneath received just enough ambient heat to dry off the sogginess.

Reassembly and toppings

No question about it. In 10 minutes the air fryer revived my meal.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

Add a personal touch

Once your freshly revived morsels come out of the air fryer, you can simply plate the fried sides and reassemble your sandwiches. It might be my experimental food habits at play, but since you’re home, why not add some fresh toppings? I know, the point of ordering delivery is to do less work. You certainly don’t have to do this, but I like to zhuzh up my sandwiches if I have the resources.

I added a fresh sprinkle of salt to my fries (they must have run out of salt in the burger kingdom near me) and poured those into a bowl. I scraped the original pile of mayo/lettuce/tomato mess back onto the bun, but I also applied some newly torn iceberg and added a few slices of my favorite half-sour pickles from Grillo’s. Depending on what you ordered and what survived, you might benefit from adding a fresh dollop of ketchup or mayonnaise, new lettuce, a couple slices of American cheese, or freshly sliced onion. 

My air-fried delivery was crispy, hot, and maintained all of its original flavor. Admittedly, there was some collateral moisture loss from the travel and re-warming, but I wouldn’t say it suffered. It made for a toastier bun and crispier chicken nuggets, and I’d take that over wet bread any day. Use this quick air-frying technique for any floppy fried-food delivery. Even if it’s freshly delivered, sometimes fast food needs some help. Take the extra five to 10 minutes to rescue it, and you’ll be glad you did.