The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp 31196FG is a medium-sized toaster oven/air fryer. It has a straightforward design, with dial controls, six functions for different cooking methods, and a 'Stay On' feature. It comes with a mesh basket for air frying, a baking tray, and a wire rack for baking.
Our Verdict
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp Toaster Oven is decent for mixed use. This medium-sized toaster oven won't fit a 9" x 13" baking sheet but can accommodate a 12" pizza. Its chamber has a lot of vertical space for taller items like whole chickens or pot roasts. It also maintains a mostly stable temperature during cooking, which helps you get good results when baking or reheating. It makes good toast fairly quickly. However, despite having an air fry function, it's not good at making quick, crispy snacks like French fries.
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Good amount of cooking capacity.
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Maintains a stable temperature.
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Toasts bread quite equally on both sides.
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Preheats quickly.
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Toasts somewhat slowly.
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Makes unevenly air fried food.
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp air fryer/toaster oven is great for reheating leftovers. It preheats quickly and doesn't overshoot your selected temperature setting, which helps keep your food from drying out before it's heated through. It won't fit a 9" x 13" baking pan but has a good amount of capacity for something like a pizza or a plate of leftovers.
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Good amount of cooking capacity.
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Doesn't overshoot temperature setting.
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Preheats quickly.
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp 31196FG is fantastic for baking. The temperature varies a little during cooking, but not very much, and it never overshoots your selected temperature setting. This helps make the toaster oven's performance more predictable and helps produce better results when baking cookies or bread. The temperature throughout the cooking chamber is also uniform, without major hot or cold spots, so your food cooks evenly wherever it is in the oven.
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Maintains a stable temperature.
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Doesn't overshoot temperature setting.
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp air fryer/toaster oven has a poor air frying performance. It comes with an air fry basket and has a good amount of surface area in its cooking chamber, but its fan isn't very powerful. If you use it to air fry foods like chicken wings or French fries, most of your food will come out underdone. It's also very slow when air frying.
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Mesh basket included.
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Makes unevenly air fried food.
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Fan isn't very powerful.
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp air fryer/toaster oven is very good for toasting. If you use its six-slice maximum capacity, it makes mostly evenly browned toast, toasting both sides of the bread equally. That said, some toaster ovens are faster. It produces slightly better results if you only use four slices at a time.
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Toasts bread quite equally on both sides.
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Toasts somewhat slowly.
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp air fryer/toaster oven has a very good capacity. It can fit the average frozen pizza or six slices of bread, and its tall cooking chamber can accommodate items like a roast chicken.
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Good amount of cooking capacity.
- 7.3 Mixed Usage
- 8.1 Leftovers
Performance Usages
- 9.0 Baking
- 4.6 Air Frying
- 7.8 Toasting
- 7.9 Cooking Capacity
Differences Between Sizes And Variants
This toaster oven comes in one 'Stainless Steel' variant. Here's a picture of our unit's label.
If you encounter another variant, let us know in the comments, and we'll update our review.
Compared To Other Toaster Ovens
The Hamilton Beach Sure-Crisp 31196FG is a medium-sized toaster oven/air fryer with a similar design to other models from the brand, like the Hamilton Beach 31143, with dial controls and no screens. It has a fan and is meant to work as an air fryer, but it doesn't perform very well for that purpose. The Hamilton Beach Quantum Air Fryer 31350G and the Cuisinart Air Fryer TOA-70 can make much more evenly crispy food. That said, the Sure-Crisp is good for toasting and maintains a more stable temperature than the Quantum Air Fryer, making it more suitable for baking.
Test Results
This medium-sized toaster oven isn't the biggest model you can get, but it still takes up quite a bit of space on your counter.
It has a good amount of capacity. The cooking chamber has a lot of vertical space, and there are three possible tray positions, so you can heat food in taller containers with a lower rack position or use the higher position when broiling. It can fit a 12" pizza or a 9" x 9" cake pan but can't accommodate a 9" x 13" baking pan.
- 10.2" x 11.2" baking tray (25.9 cm x 28.5 cm)
- 11.1" x 12.9" wire rack (28.1 cm x 32.9 cm)
- 9.8" x 10.8" mesh air fry basket (25 cm x 27.5 cm)
- User guide
It's not very versatile. It has a fan that works with its 'Air Fry' function, but it's not very powerful. Similarly, it doesn't have very high broil power, so it isn't the fastest broiler. It has six functions for different cooking methods and a 'Stay On' option, so you're not limited to a 60-minute cooking time.
| Function | Temperature | Timer | Fan |
| Reheat | 150 °F - 450 °F | 1 - 60 minutes or 'Stay On' | Off |
| Pizza | 150 °F - 450 °F | 1 - 60 minutes or 'Stay On' | Off |
| Bake | 150 °F - 450 °F | 1 - 60 minutes or 'Stay On' | Off |
| Broil | 450 °F | 1 - 60 minutes or 'Stay On' | Off |
| Toast | 450 °F | Depends on shade setting | Off |
| Air Fry | 150 °F - 450 °F | 1 - 60 minutes or 'Stay On' | On |
It's very easy to clean, and you won't have any problem reaching into the medium-sized cooking chamber to clean it. The rack guides aren't difficult to clean, and the lower elements are spaced apart and easy to reach underneath. The upper elements are a bit more of a challenge, but you can fit a sponge behind them. That said, neither the cooking chamber nor the baking tray has a non-stick coating. The fan outlets are also difficult to clean properly.
It's great for toasting six slices at once. It toasts the surface of the bread quite evenly and equally on both sides.
It's great for toasting four slices at once. It does a good job of browning the bread evenly. There's even less difference between the top and bottom of the bread when you only use four slices at once.
It's poor at air frying. It has an air fry mode and a mesh air fry basket, which usually helps produce better results. However, it's very slow, and air-fried foods like French fries, chicken wings, and Brussels sprouts get unevenly cooked, so most of your food ends up pale and underdone. For a toaster oven that air fries faster, the Hamilton Beach Air Fryer 31350 produces much better results in about half the time.
This medium-sized toaster oven preheats quickly.
It has excellent temperature stability. While the temperature varies a little during cooking compared with some other toaster ovens, overall it stays very stable and accurate to your selected setting. It never overshoots the temperature setting, which helps reduce the chance of your food burning or drying out. The temperature is also uniform throughout the cooking chamber, without any major hot or cold spots.
While some toaster ovens are faster, such as the Ninja Flip SP151, it's a pretty quick way to make six slices of bread at once. It's also reasonably efficient with just four slices.