$162 vs $19 Fried Chicken: Pro Chef & Home Cook Swap Ingredients | Epicurious

The original Ingredient Swap duo returns as professional chef instructor Frank Proto and home cook extraordinaire Lorenzo trade fried chicken recipes and hit the kitchen. We set Lorenzo up with $162 worth of ingredients and Frank's recipe while sending just under 20 bucks worth of goods back to our esteemed expert. As is customary, food scientist Rose dialed in to assist Lorenzo along the way. How did his skills stack up against Frank's expert level recipe? What tricks can Frank break out to improvise his way up to gourmet?

Follow Lorenzo at @rollinabenzo
Check out chef Frank on his YouTube Channel, ProtoCooks!
Follow him on Instagram at @protocooks
Rose is on Instagram at @rosemarytrout_foodscience

Director: Cory Cavin
Director of Photography: Joel Kingsbury
Editor: LJ D'Arpa
Talent: Frank Proto
Talent: Lorenzo Beronilla

Sr. Culinary Director: Kelly Janke
Producer: Isabel Alcantara
Culinary Producer: Kat Boytsova
Culinary Associate Producer: Jessica Do
Line Producer: Jennifer McGinity
Associate Producer: Alicia Aswat
Production Manager: Janine Dispensa
Production Coordinator: Elizabeth Hymes

Camera Operators: Miguel Zamora, Kirsten Potts
Audio: Rebecca O'Neil
Production Assistant: Amara McNeil

Post Production Supervisor: Stephanie Cardone
Post Production Coordinator: Scout Alter
Supervising Editor: Eduardo Araújo
Assistant Editor: Andy Morrell
Graphics Supervisor: Ross Rackin
Graphics, Animation, VFX: Léa Kichler


ABOUT EPICURIOUS
Browse thousands of recipes and videos from Bon Appétit, Gourmet, and more. Find inventive cooking ideas, ingredients, and restaurant menus from the world’s largest food archive.

[BenBenBenBenBenBenBenBenBenBn]

This might sound a tad exaggerated, but I sincerely think this series is important. It shows 2 essential things: Even the most complex aspects of cooking are approachable by non-professionals (although it might take a bit of time to perfect), and you don't need expensive ingredients to make delicious, unique and creative dishes as long as you know what you're doing. All in a very fun and dynamic format. Thank you epicurious

[VerhoevenSimon]

I love seeing Frank and Lorenzo pair up, and always nice to see their cooking techniques explained.

[deathlyshuriken]

Rose: It sounds like heaven!
Lorenzo: It looks like hell!
That may be my new favorite line from these vids. Lorenzo is the best.

[DudeImFonz]

I love how nice everyone is in this series. Not drama filled like American TV cooking shows. Just fun and informative with good people

[Tenhys]

What i like the most about this series is how absolutely unapologetic Frank is enjoying the abusing of his co-workers with a complete shenanigan festival of "over-the-top" ingredients for everyone else to cook, to a quite near sociapathic level ; he's screwing with them all the way up and down, absolutely loving every second of it. You can just feel it (especially with the parmesan cheese wheel. That one was clearly a cut above.)

[youri]

I just think that Lorenzo and Frank are THE BEST together. I love every single episode with these two! Legends!!

[adyasingh]

Since fried chicken was too easy, frank just had to make his own bread, milk and oil. Next time, you can even make fresh bread for breadcrumbs.

[kunoichichica]

I've been watching this series and 4 Levels religiously since they started on YT and I just wanna take a moment to say that this series really was a stroke of brilliance; the sheer amount of knowledge I've amassed from literally just watching and learning from ALL these chefs (yes, even the level 1s and 2s) is honestly insane. It's educational, entertaining, each of the chefs all have beautiful souls and interesting personalities that shine through on screen and watching them be passionate and excited about the food they're cooking is really quite a joy. :) A big thanks to Epicurious, the cast and the crew of this show. 👏🏾🙌🏾 you guys are doing phenomenal work.

Sidenote: Thanks to this series, Frank will have discovered over 100 different ways to cook with pickle juice 😂

[kebjamora]

Frank: Instead of the waffles, I made a biscuit.
Lorenzo: Of course you did.

🤣

[BenBenBenBenBenBenBenBenBenBn]

The amount of Joy that Lorenzo exhudes about the crispy bits is truly inspiring

[Am_Cookie]

Lorenzo immediately knew who his counterpart was when he saw that tray of shenanigans

[HIWA]

Frank is such a good teacher, I could learn with his thorough explanations!

[jordanbrown]

Please do an April Fools episode where they make their own recipes. Just for a quick change up. Plenty of time to plan. 😁

[JustMe-ckxz]

I love how they switch because it shows us that we can all attempt next level cooking and the demonstrations are really easy to follow. Don’t be afraid to expand!

[joshscorcher]

Every other Swap Ingredients Episode, someone inevitably goes:

[JH.K]

I watch a lot of the YouTube shorts where cooks make these delicious meals and just eat what they've created in front of the camera themselves and my favorite part of this episode is that they actually share each other's creations! Love watching them interact and enjoy each other's food!

[peeenguinne]

I have been waiting for fried chicken in Pro vs. Home cook. Chef's in this series tend to explain a lot of really important things in cooking in relation to the dish.

[amberlee]

Every episode of this with Frank results in the home cook yelling "FRANK" every time and I'm here for it. Like I'm convinced he picks the most complicated and expensive ingredients he can solely to mess with them.

[jeff__w]

“Originally, Lorenzo gave me ingredients to make chicken and waffles. I’m going in a different direction—I’m going to make _Suprême de volaille rôti, champignons de Paris cuisinés à la moutarde à l'ancienne.”_

[strawberrycupcake]

I believe whenever it’s Lorenzo going against frank franks tries to think of the most out there recipe just to make it more chaotic 😭😭