I made tasty, fudgy brownies in an air fryer, and they cooked in half the time

I’m a big fan of indulgent sweet treats such as cake and cookies, and none more so than the humble brownie. This chocolatey-based cake has a crisp top and a fudgy center - whether you’re looking for elevenses or an afternoon pick me up, a brownie is the perfect sweet treat.

However, baking them can be time-consuming, taking around 35 minutes to cook in the oven, and the results can be unpredictable - it’s a fine line between a squidgy center and the brownie being underbaked.

The best air fryers have a much smaller cooking cavity than a traditional oven, which means the hot air can circulate around food more rapidly, cooking it quicker than traditional methods. This also means the results tend to be more consistent - something I experienced when I made French Toast in an air fryer .

This led me to wonder if using an air fryer might have a better result, turning out brownies with a crisp shell and a squidgy center far quicker than an oven?

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Read on to discover what happened when we attempted to make brownies in an air fryer - or, if you’ve already decided you want to invest in this handy kitchen appliance, check out the best prices on the best air fryers we like right now:

Let's get baking

I’m a huge fan of a bakery in London called Konditor and Cook - it offers an array of delicious cakes and cookies, but for me, its brownies are second to none.

It offers the perfect balance of crispness and gooey, fudginess. However, as the branches of the bakery aren’t close to areas I frequent, and until recently they didn’t deliver to my home address, I don’t get a chance to enjoy the brownies as often as I’d like.

I couldn’t have been more thrilled when the recipe was published online by Hello - it meant I could enjoy these delicious brownies whenever I like. In fact, they became a staple bake for me during lockdown. So it made sense that it was this recipe I used when trying to cook brownies in an air fryer.

I mixed the ingredients into a smooth batter  - do check out the recipe for a more detailed guide on how to do this - and went to fill a baking tin with it. However, while I would usually line an 8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper and add the brownie batter, it became clear this wasn’t going to be viable.

Instant, the manufacturers of the Vortex Plus air fryer we were using (and currently our top-rated air fryer) state there must be 1 inch / 2.5 cm of space around any metal or glass containers placed in the air fryer.

Due to the lip on the 8-inch square tin, I wasn’t even able to get it to fit inside the frying basket, let alone with enough space surrounding it. So instead, I opted for an 8-inch circular pan that I’ve previously used to make cinnamon rolls in an air fryer .

Some basic calculations made it clear that the pan could not hold the same quantity of batter as my usual tin, so I poured slightly over half the batter into the pan, leaving the remainder to one side for cooking up after this batch of brownies had finished.

Now there was nothing left to do other than get cooking.

Verdict

When it came to the cooking temperature and duration, I thought back to when I made air fryer donuts so well, my partner thought they were from Krispy Kreme . There, I learnt through trial and error that it's best to use the same temperature as stated in the recipe, so I set the air fryer to 356 F / 180 C.

As I was using slightly less batter than usual, I opted for a cooking duration of 17 minutes, which is half the usual time I cook these brownies for. I reasoned that if the brownies weren’t ready, I could cook them for a few additional minutes, rather than have to scrap the whole batch if they were overcooked.

The easy way to tell brownies are ready? Give the pan a gentle shake, the brownie won’t wobble (if it does it's underbaked) Also look for a shiny top that’s slightly cracked.

I dialled in the temperature and duration on the Instant Vortex Plus, which saw the appliance preheat for three minutes before alerting me it had reached the required temperature. I then placed the pan of brownie batter on the crisper plate in the air fryer basket and cooking commenced.

Part way through cooking the air fryer alerted me that it’s time to turn the contents of the basket, so the hot air can reach every inch of the food to ensure a crisp finish. However, in this instance, I chose to ignore the alert, as, unlike other cakes, brownies shouldn’t be cooked all the way through: this is what creates the gooey center.

Air fryers have much smaller cooking cavities than ovens, which means the hot can circulate more rapidly around food, which is why it cooks quicker. That's why I thought it would be good for speeding up the time brownies take to cook, while still maintaining the goey, fudgy center.

Once I got to the end of the cooking time, I opened the air fryer drawer and the brownie was clearly cooked. Given the top was shiny and had a couple of cracks in it, I lifted the pan out and gave it a gentle shake - zero wobble, so as far as I was concerned the brownies were cooked to my liking (if you prefer brownies that are cakeier (ie, firmer), consider increasing the cooking duration by a few minutes).

I removed the cake pan from the frying basket and left it on the side to cool. I then transferred the brownies to the fridge for a couple of hours to ensure the fudgy center firmed up a little and didn’t create a sticky mess when being eaten.

After an agonizing wait ( they smelt so delicious), it was time to cut into the brownies. The top cracked and made a pleasing crunch as I sliced into it, and I was relieved to see the center was fudgy but not runny. A quick taste test confirmed these were as good as every batch of brownies I made in my oven. Using an air fryer really had sped up cooking time without affecting the texture.

So now I’ve proved I can get my brownie fix in almost half the cooking time it takes in usual methods, I certainly will carry on using an air fryer next time I want a chocolatey-fudgy treat to indulge in - and you should too.

A crappy Windows 11 driver is killing HP laptops – and owners are angry

Update: HP has responded, telling us that "We are aware of the issue and the driver has been removed from Windows Update. We are working quickly to resolve this matter.” This is a promising development which means the driver won't be automatically (or accidently) installed. Hopefully HP will release a fixed update soon.

Original story follows...

Owners of some HP laptops are complaining that after upgrading to Windows 11 , the ordinarily invisible HP Hotkey UWP Service, which runs in the background, starts taking up huge amounts of memory -- effectively rendering their machines useless.

HP customers have taken to HP’s support forums to complain about the issue, in a thread that's been viewed almost 20,000 times. The HP Hotkey UWP Service is a driver that lets you use the Function key on your laptop keyboard with the F1 – F0 keys to perform certain tasks, such as turning audio volume up and down. It starts automatically when Windows boots on an HP laptop, and users complain that while in Windows 10 it would take up minimal memory, in Windows 11 it takes up an enormous amount.

One angry owner complains that it’s using 49GB of the laptop's 64GB RAM.

That’s obviously a sign that something is amiss: No app should take up that much memory, especially a relatively simple service for keyboard shortcuts, and it points toward an issue such as a memory leak with the Windows 11 implementation of the HP Hotkey UWP Service.

This issue isn’t affecting all HP laptops – we’re writing this story on an HP Elite Dragonfly G2 with Windows 11 installed, and HP Hotkey UWP Service is using just 2MB of memory – but judging by the responses to the post on the HP support forum, plenty of people are struggling with this issue.

Analysis: Where is HP?

The thread about the HP Hotkey UWP Service taking up huge amounts of memory was started in July 2021, but people are still complaining about this issue in 2022, with little sign that HP is aware of the issue, or if it's working on a fix.

In fact, the latest message on the forum concerning the issue -- from the tail end of February -- is particularly damming. After reporting that their ZBook 15 G3 is suffering from having 100% of its RAM used up, the clearly frustrated user writes “HP -- where are you?”

Worryingly, this user is also on Windows 10, which means this problem could also affect people who haven’t upgraded to Windows 11, though the majority of people complaining about this issue appear to be on the newer operating system.

The fact that the company has been silent on this matter is concerning and only fuels more anger about the issue. Dodgy drivers and software updates happen all the time, but as long as companies are transparent about those issues and clear about what steps are being taken to address them, customers will normally understand.

Clearly, HP needs to get on top of this problem ASAP before the anger gets worse. We’ve reached out to the company for comment about this situation and to get clarity on what it's doing to address this issue. We’ll update this story as soon as we hear back.

In the meantime, it appears that some people have found that rolling back the LAN/WLAN/WWAN Switching and Hot Key Service driver (found in the Device Manager) to version 8.10.14.1 can help.

Reinstalling the driver (again, through Device Manager) may also help. Preventing the driver from loading with Windows is another option, though it’s not ideal.

Meta's Project Cambria price leaks and, spoiler alert, you're not going to like it

Meta’s VR hardware roadmap has apparently been leaked giving us details about its next four headsets, including the price and specs of its next VR headset: Project Cambria .

Known only by its codename, this souped-up device is expected to supplant Meta’s current best headset, the Oculus Quest 2 (now rebranded as Meta Quest 2 ), when it launches later this year.

When it was announced in October 2021 , Mark Zuckerberg (Meta’s CEO) explained that Cambria will be a “high-end” piece of tech that will produce better VR and MR (mixed reality) experiences than anything Meta has achieved before. This means improved specs and software could be headed our way.

More recently, Zuckerberg described it as a replacement for your laptop and work setup . Now a report from The Information has reaffirmed the idea that Cambria will be a “laptop for the face”.

The leaked internal road map suggests that Project Cambria will cost $799 (around £640 / AU$1,125) and will be about as powerful as a Chromebook – and it will run on Meta’s own Android-based operating system.

Based on the best Chromebooks you can currently buy, as well as the specs of the Meta Quest 2, it sounds like Project Cambria will have at least 8GB RAM and likely around 256 GB of storage. We’ll also likely see its processor get a boost too. However, Meta may have to design its own chip, as Qualcomm has yet to launch a follow-up to the Snapdragon XR2 that powers Meta’s Quest 2.

We’ve also previously heard that Cambria will incorporate dual mini LED displays that will likely offer a 120Hz refresh rate (to improve upon the Quest 2’s “experimental” 120Hz feature).

A welcome redesign

On top of that, the only released image for Project Cambria (seen above) shows that the controllers have been redesigned slightly. Unlike those used for the Quest 2, these new controllers lack tracking rings – suggesting that Cambria will use a different method for following where your hands move.

As for its other VR headsets, the same report from The Information says Meta is expected to launch the Quest 3 (codenamed Stinson) in 2023, followed by Project Funston and Project Cardiff in 2024.

Funston will reportedly be an improvement upon Project Cambria, with Cardiff expected to be a lower-end device.

A Meta Quest 4 in 2024 feels quite unlikely as the Quest 3 would have only launched the year before. As such we expect Cardiff will instead be some kind of AR glasses (perhaps the follow-up to the RayBan Stories Smart Glasses ) or perhaps a VR headset designed for kids – a device we have long expected Meta wants to produce.

We'll have to wait a bit longer before Meta reveals more about Project Stinson or Cardiff – we still don't have much official information for Project Cambria or the Meta Quest 3 yet. But if four headsets are dropping by the end of 2024, Meta might want to start making some announcements soon.