What is Air-Drying and Why Does it Matter?

It's Not Magic. But It's Pretty Close.

People often ask us how we turn a whole apple — skin, core, pips and all — into a light, crunchy crisp with no added anything. The answer is air-drying. And once you understand it, you'll never look at a crisp the same way again.

So What Actually is Air-Drying?

Air-drying removes moisture from whole fruit and vegetables using warm air — no frying, no added oils, no preservatives, no shortcuts. But here's where Nim's does things differently.

Traditional dehydrating is a static process that can take 8-9 hours. Our proprietary method is something else entirely. The fruit and veg almost float through the air as they dry, moving continuously through our process so they dry in less than half the time of traditional dehydrating. It's faster, more consistent, and produces a lighter, crunchier crisp — and it's completely unique to us.

The result? A crisp that retains the natural flavour, colour, and nutrients of the original fruit or veg. What you're eating is essentially just... fruit. Or veg. In crisp form. That's it.

The Only Crisp Brand Licensed by Public Health England as 1 of Your 5 a Day

We're pretty proud of this one. Nim's is the only crisp brand in the UK licensed by Public Health England to count as one of your five a day. Not "kind of" one of your five a day. Actually, officially, one of your five a day. So that bag of apple crisps? Counts. You're welcome.

Why Not Just Fry Them?

Frying is faster and cheaper, but it comes with baggage. Take a standard 32.5g pack of fried crisps — around 9.6g of that pack is pure fat. That's nearly 30% of what you're eating that's just oil. Not crisp. Oil.

A 20g bag of Nim's apple crisps? That's 20g of pure apple in concentrated form. In fact, it takes 180g of fresh apple to make one 20g bag — so every bite is packed with the real thing, nothing diluted by oil or additives.

Our air-drying method is more involved, but the result is a snack that's genuinely better for you and actually tastes of the thing it's made from. We think that's worth it. (Your taste buds agree.)

The Whole Fruit Thing

Most fruit and veg crisps on the market are made from just the flesh — the skin, core, and seeds get discarded. At Nim's, we use the whole fruit or vegetable (except pineapple, which we core because nobody wants that). Skin, core, seeds and all.

Why? Because that's where a huge amount of the flavour and nutrients live. The skin of an apple is packed with fibre and antioxidants. The core has flavour. The pips add texture. By using the whole thing, we get a more complex, more nutritious, and more interesting crisp — and we waste absolutely nothing.

The Wonky Bit

We also source wonky fruit and veg — the misshapen, slightly odd-looking produce that doesn't make it onto supermarket shelves. Not because it tastes worse (it doesn't), but because it doesn't look "perfect".

We think that's a bit daft. So we rescue it, air-dry it, and turn it into something brilliant. Less food waste, more delicious crisps. Everyone wins.

The Bottom Line

Our proprietary air-drying method is faster, more innovative, and more careful than traditional dehydrating or frying. It gives us a snack that's made from whole fruit and veg, with nothing added and nothing wasted — and the only crisp in the UK that officially counts as one of your five a day.

Now go and eat some. You've earned it.