【Painful Man And Woman】

Spoiler alert: Mozzarella sticks are Painful Man And Womangood. Even averagemozzarella sticks are pretty dang tasty. Crunchy, melty, hot cheese? There is literally no way to make that bad.

So, yes, this TikTok recipe from @arimonika for homemade mozzarella sticks is tasty...because you're making mozzarella sticks. Now, of course, you could easily keep frozen mozz sticks in your freezer and come up with a decent product. Along with roasting vegetables, cooking frozen foods is one of the most practical and useful applications for the air fryer. This TikTok recipe, however, is a nice, fresh alternative. It takes just a bit of effort and at the end you're rewarded with melty cheese. And it'll be at least marginally healthier than the deep-fried version. So that's nice.

Here's was you need to know to make the recipe.

Ingredients

• 1 pound block of mozzarella cheese

• 3 eggs

• 1/2 cup of all purpose flour

• 1.5 cups of breadcrumbs

• 1 small jar of marinara.

Directions

1. Slice the block of mozzarella into planks that are roughly mozzarella-stick shaped.

2. Next we're doing the classic breading procedure: Dredge and cover each plank with flour, then dip into the egg, then completely cover with breadcrumbs.

3. For even more crunch, dip the breaded mozz stick back into the egg, then back again into the breadcrumbs.

4. Spray your air fryer basket then air fry at 350 degrees for about nine minutes, or until breadcrumbs look nice and toasty.

5. Dip in the marinara and enjoy!

The details

First things first, here is how the finished product looked for @arimonika.

Tasty looking, right?

My final product looked pretty similar.

There is, however, one change I'd likely make moving forward. I'd swap in Italian-style seasoned breadcrumbs for the panko breadcrumbs I used. For most applications, I prefer panko, but I think traditional, smaller-grain breadcrumbs would give you better cheese coverage and texture. The final product would be closer to the mozz sticks we all know and love. The panko breadcrumbs were a bit too craggy and didn't cling as well as traditional breadcrumbs might've. Learn from my mistake.

• You should make sweet potato fries shaped like pumpkins for Halloween
• Air frying french toast sticks makes no sense. Just use a pan.
• You simply have to air fry your Brussels sprouts
• Please don't air fry scrambled eggs.
• Why would anyone want a basket of air-fried pearl onions? Just why?

Now, that being said, my mozzarella sticks were still tasty. I did lose a little bit of cheese to leakage during the cooking process, but I still got melty, crunchy mozz sticks. There is nothing wrong with that, my friend.

If you happen to be the sort of person who keeps mozzarella sticks in the freezer, then I'm not sure it's worth making this homemade version. After all, with the frozen bag of mozz sticks you don't end up with eggy fingers. You'll also likely loose less cheese to leakage because the mozzarella starts out frozen, meaning it won't turn liquid and melt out.

But this is a fun, easy recipe that'll give you a tasty result in a pinch. It would also certainly be a fun project for a family to make together. In the end, it's crispy, melty cheese. And that is always a good thing.