Expert chef Frank and home cook Gabi are swapping materials and hoping for the best!
We gave Gabi $260 worth of ingredients and Frank's recipe notebook then asked her to recreate his pork chop dinner as best she could.
To lend a remote helping hand, food scientist Rose dialed in for a brief teleconference and pep talk.
On the other side, Frank received a meager $17 worth of supplies and tried to improvise his way up to gourmet.
Who’s got the chops to succeed under these mixed up circumstances?
- Even though Frankdoesn't know me that well,at all, I'd really liketo grill with Frank.Grilling some dogs, he'sin his hotdog costume,it's Halloween.- Hi, I'm Frank, I'm a professional chef.And this is a $260 pork chop dinner.- Hi, I'm Gabi, I am a home cook,and this is my $17 pork chop dinner.[mischievous bouncy music]Ooh!- No!- Ooh, I'll take that [laughs].- All right, I can work with that.[Gabi laughing]Beer, I like beer.- Are those saffron strands in the salt?I'm gonna read Frank's diary.- For my dinner, I plannedon doing a higher end dinnerwith a Spanish theme.I had a really beautifulpiece of Iberico pork.- Very, very, very different thanmy Pennsylvania girl recipe.- Pork is supposed to befatty and the fat is whatmakes it delicious, fat equals flavor.I had all the ingredientsto make a pommes paillassonwith Iberico ham.It's a huge potato cakethat you cut into slices.- Pommes paillasson, is that right?- [Frank] Russet potatoes,clarified butter,unsalted butter.- Hmm, double dipping on the butter.- [Frank] Cured, Iberico ham.- This is like what youeat on Christmas day.- [Frank] Idiazabal cheese.- Hard cheese in thatworld of Spanish cheeses.- Sticking with the Spanishtheme, broccoli rabe,with chiles and smoked paprika.- Broccoli rabe, kinda thing.- And all topped off with a grilledspring onion vinaigrette.- I don't really knowwhere the vinaigrette goes.Oh, on the pork chop, okay.- With Gabi's recipe, wehave simpler ingredients.Things are more likelyto find in a supermarketor in your home.- This dish is very nostalgic for me.Mt grandmother, shealways made me pork chopsand scallop potatoes.I love those memories with her.Oh my god, I have an actual tearsliding down my cheek, sorry.I'm a very emotional person,if you haven't figured that out yet.- Unsalted butter,russet potatoes, garlic,heavy cream, thyme, cheddar cheese,and thank goodness, we have some beer.- You gotta have beer when you cook.- These ingredients are simple,but with some good technique,we can elevate themand make them better.So if I had to guess, thiswould cost about 18, $19.Pretty close.- I would say all of this is maybe 150.260, woo!I'm gonna start withthe pommes paillasson.Pommes paillasson,there's gonna be someonein the comments like, "I'mFrench, she butchered it."- At the end of the day, it's justa beautifully browned potato cake.Butter, potatoes, salt, pepper.- I don't see anyadditional footnotes for howto exactly put this together,which is a little concerning.- The key to thepaillasson potatoes is thatyou are pushing it into the pan.You want no air gaps so youget this nice filling layer.It's almost like frosting in the middle,but maybe a little moredelicious than frosting,of cheese and ham.- Rose and I are goingto have a little chatabout these pommes paillasson.Oh my gosh, how are you?It's so nice to meet you,wow, this is such a wonderful.- It is so nice to meet you.- I know most of these ingredients,but there are a couplethings I'm super not quitefamiliar with and Iwould love some advice.The pommes paillasson [laughs].- I think your French sounds perfect.We're gonna take the match stick potatoes,a little bit of salt, put them in a pan,press down, and fry them, basically.If you can use a clarified butter,that's a really delicious way to go.- Okay, that's on the list.- Don't rinse your potatoes.You want a nice starchy potatoso I think if you use a russet potato,that will work really well for this.If it seems like there'swater that's coming out,you can squeeze it outand get rid of that water.It sounds like there'sdefinitely a really niceSpanish theme to this one.- Yes, I love it.- Good luck, I think you'regonna be great at it.- Thank you so much.I gotta go in confident.Start out here so I canend somewhere around here.- Originally, Gabi had planned on makinga potatoes au gratin.Basically, au gratin is adish that you brown stuff in.Cheesy, creamy, comforting.It's a great comfort foodand I think that Gabihad mentioned that it was somethingshe made with her grandmother.I'm gonna get rid of the gratin dish.And I'm gonna use individual foil bowls.It's probably gonna be a little smallerthan the portion that Gabi served,but worse case scenario,have a second one,you dirty savage.- Obviously, I don't need touse all this incredible ham,so I'm just gonna eat alittle bit while I startshredding my cheese.Shredding, yeah, that's plenty.Now I can focus on the taters,as I like to call them.Gonna peel them, I don'thave the best technique.- So first thing I'm gonna do,I'm gonna butter these,'cause I eventuallywant to get this out.Unsalted butter, I control the salt,make sure that you get into the corners.So the next thing we'regonna do is potatoes.These are russet potatoes,or Idaho potatoes.I do like potato skinswhen I roast potatoes.But for this dish, I wantit to be kinda a niceblonde, white, it's an aesthetic choice.Potatoes like a [mumbles],they're a little more waxy, okay?And we want that starchy potatoesto hold our gratin together.If you have one of these peelers,there's this little thing here,and what it's there for is if you havean eye of a potato, you just scoop it outand you pop the eye of the potato out.- Oh, is that was this is for?♪ The more you know ♪- You can see when Ipeel I do long strokes.As a chef, you want tobe efficient and quick.- These are ready to beturned into match sticks.My friend, the mandoline,which is one of the mostterrifying objects in the kitchen.I'm just gonna be ascareful as I possibly can.- You want to use a mandolineto get a nice, uniform thickness.And I'm going for abouta quarter of an inch.A couple of things you wanna be very, veryconscious about is thatyou're putting your handin the way of a blade.You're pushing your hand towards a blade.- That's why it says to be careful.- You don't wanna have a bloody gratin.- Very clunky, ah!- Go over the blade, asI get close to the blade,I was grabbing the potato,now I flatten out my hand.- I can no longer talk until I am done.I start sweating.Sorry, I talked.- All I'm gonna do with these potatoesis put them into the pot, right?We're gonna cook them right away, okay?I'm gonna get a piece of garlic,and you grab it, and youthrow it across the room.I usually grab this endand twist it a little,and then I just lean on it.If you lean on it, you'llget all the cloves out,give it a little whack.It's not gonna be overpowering,it goes right into the pot.- My taters are turninga little brown now,so I wanna get them into the pan asap.I'm going to use clarified butter.I'm going to go ahead and give this likea nice hefty pinch of salt.I know Rosemary said tokeep it really compressed.We're working harder,not smarter right now.Start putting these potatoes in,and then I'm gonna squish them all down.Make sure I have some for the top.I wanna make sure that I havea really nice, firm bottom layer.I wonder how Frank's doing.- I don't want this to boil,I just want this to simmer.I'm gonna add cream, I'mgonna hit it with some salt,and I did say a little bit of salt,but for the most part, it's a lot of salt.Potatoes are one ofthose things that peopleconsistently under season.And again, being the salt master.Black pepper and a white dish.Classical French cooking, cardinal sin,I'm going to break that rule.I like the kind ofsharpness of black pepper.What's gonna happen isthat as the potatoes cook,they're gonna absorb some of the cream,and they're gonna absorb some of the salt.- I'm gonna go ahead andstart putting in my cheeseover the top here.Look at the fat, oh, it's amazing.The fat of it already melting,like savory, fatty ice cream.I'm gonna go ahead and add in the restof my potatoes and tamp those back down.I want these potatoes to be perfect.- Be careful not toscorch it on the bottom.The cream's gonna go fromthat cream consistencyis gonna start to get alittle thick and bubbly.While I'm waiting this for simmer,I'm gonna put a little bit of thymeand I'm gonna grate some cheese.Do we have a sharp cheddar here?It's a great cheese.But you gotta be carefulwith it in this dish.You have to add it towards the end.You don't wanna bring thiscream mixture to a boilwith the cheese, because thenthe cheese breaks and gets oily.What I'll do is I'll cut the cheese.Instead of doing thisthe granny-way style,I turn it on its side and I push, right?I find this just to be a little easierthan the old way of grating.That's how you grate cheese right.- I wish Frank was a part of my family.Can you imagine Frank at Thanksgiving?Frank, for the Fourth of July, on a grill?Frank on Halloween?I'd really like to imagine Frank in oneof those hot dog costumes.He's grilling hot dogs inthe hot dog costume, ugh!What a vision.- We've got movement.We're simmering away, just a light simmer.We don't want this to boil very hard.You can smell a little garlic,but it's not overpowering.The more you processgarlic, the stronger it is.That's why I chose not to chop this.So I'm gonna stop there andthen I'm going to assemble.You can see that everything's niceand thick and delicious.Little bit of the cheese.I'm going to overfill these a little,I'm not gonna just kindafill them to the top,I'm going to go allthe way up past the rimbecause they will shrink just a little.Some more potatoes, alittle bit more cheese.I wonder how Gabi's doingwith the pommes paillasson.- Really, really could usethat beer right now, woo!- Thanks, Gabi.Ahh, so refreshing.- I know at some pointthis is gonna have to flipand that's what I'm terrified of.I'm gonna wanna tuck theseedges in before I flip it,because I don't wantthem going everywhere.I'm putting the butter on the sideso it slips a little easier.It will also toast thoseedges a little more.Oh my goodness, it is toasty.This plate will help me in flipping this.Do I wanna do this first?We're gonna do this first.I'm gonna go ahead and say hail Mary.Take two.[Gabi yelling]Oh my god, I did it, I did it.Look at how pretty it is,it's golden, it's brown.- I'm gonna top all these off sothey have plenty of cream in them.The top part is really gonnabe the bottom of the gratins.These are gonna go in the ovenfor about 15 to 20 minutes.- Put the clarified butter back in.I think that the best approachis just to slide it on in.I can take a breath for the first timesince we've started [laughs].I'm really excited that ithas this crust on the topbecause I feel like it's just gonna crunchand in the middle you're gonna havethat delightful surprise.Oh yeah, I think we're done.Slide this off onto this rackand then it's gonnadrain some of the butter.What a treat, pommes paillasson.Up next is Frank's Grilled Broccoli Rabe.And that terrifies me a little bit.Okay Frank, let's do this.- Originally, Gabi wasgoing to roast her carrots.But I thought, since we have some beer,they're gonna be kind of beerand brown sugar glazed carrots.When I peel carrots, I'm gonnacut the ends off first, okay?And this just makes it a little easierand quicker to peel.Now I can just go with one swipeand get that carrot clean.- Wow, it's like changing before my eyes.Come on out kids, you're getting pruney.Into the ice bath.All right, my broccoli rabeis officially all blanched.- We do something called an oblique cut.Turn it like a third of aturn towards you and cutkind of right in the middleof your previous cut.And this gives us kind oflike an even carrot cuteven though the carrots aren't even.I'm gonna go directly into the pan,I'm not even turning the pan on yet.You can kinda see that you get thislike almost like a diamond shapeand it, you know, shinesbright like a diamond.And they'll cook evenly.And we just want to simmer these.I'm going to take a nice knob of butter,don't be shy with the butter.This is my drinking beer,I'm keeping this here.I'm gonna cover the carrots.And what's cool about the Black and Tan,it's got some really nice caramel notes.So they're gonna match kinda the sauce upwith the carrots.The carrots have some sweetness,this has some caramelflavor, a little bit of salt,and then we have some brown sugar.I think brown sugar highlightsthose same caramel notesthat we have in the beer.Break your butter up.The butter, the sugar and the beerare going to form the base of our glaze.- I'm gonna make an oilfor my broccoli rabewhen I grill is.I love olive oil so much.I like garlic, we're gonna use a lot.There's probably somehack that Frank knowsthat I don't.- [Frank] If you lean on it,you get all the cloves out,just give it a little whack.- Toss these in, I wanna let thatinfuse a little bitbefore I add in the chilesbecause I wanna make sure that thesearen't going to overpower everything elseand be too spicy or anything like that.Pop them in.Hmm, they smell good, maybe one more.If you haven't had pimenton,it's like a sweet paprika.It's so good, it's smokey,it's like the Mezcal of spices [laughs].I feel like I wanna just addin a little salt and pepper,nothing crazy though,because we already havethe chiles in there.I'm gonna set it righthere on the cutting boardand let it cool.Now we're gonna grill my broccoli rabe.Our nicely, beautifully blanched,for the first time in my life,may I add, broccoli rabe.And now I'm just gonna go ahead and takeall throughout and get it coveredso it's not going to besticking to the grill.Go ahead and hit the grill, ooh.Very nice, oh yeah, we'restarting to get some char.We don't wanna burn them,but we want there to be a little bitsomething something going on.Hey, I'm just gonna let it do it's thingand wish I had that beer in my hand.Does Frank have my beer?- Trying to get me drunk, huh?- I hope he's enjoying it at least.- Give me six more,we'll see where I'm at.So while the carrots are happilybubbling away in our beer,I'm gonna take the chanceto make our pork chopand the sauce that goes with the dish.There's really not much to do to thisother than get it nice andbrown and don't overcook it.I'm gonna season it well,just a little bit of pepper.The salt's gonna form acrust with the pepper.The middle part of the meathas no seasoning at all.It's gonna be seasoned as you eat it.What I'm looking for is thatmy oil kinda makes ripplesand I'm also looking fora little bit of smoke.I take my pork chop,just put it into the pan,and drop it away from you.Leave it alone.- All right, I think thesehave a nice char on themso I'm gonna go aheadand put them on here.I know that Frank is afan of layering flavorsso a little extra drizzle, a little salt.All right, we're gonna make a vinaigrette.I got my spring onions, my herbs,we're gonna toss them allup, stir them togetherand gonna make this vinaigretteand then this is gonna endup going on top of my pork.I'm gonna go ahead andtoss these in olive oilbefore I start charing them.All right, on they go.We wanna get that nice charred flavorincorporated into the vinaigrette.Get my garlic started.Lots of garlic in this dish.Mince, mince, mince, mince, mince.Oregano is just the coziest little herb.I also don't wanna useto much of my jalapenobecause spicy isn't necessarilya staple of Spanish cooking.My onions are lookinglike they would like toflip on their backside.Oh, man, look at that!All right Frank, I see whatyou're doing here with this.- And we're gonna leave it on this sidefor maybe seven to eight minutes,maybe a little bit more,depending on how the brown looks.But I'll lower my heat just a little'cause I got some nicesmoke going on here.Some of the juices are gonnacome off this pork chopand carmelize and inFrance they call that fond.You don't wanna get rid of that stuff.You can see I have somenice browning there, right?After I sear this side, I'mgonna hold it up with my tongs,and try and brown this piece of fat off.I'm gonna turn it over andget that fat nice and brown.Now's a good time for a sip of beer.- My parsley is pretty finely chopped,which I want for my vinaigrette.For my oil, three-quarter cup,glug, glug, glug, glug, glug, glug, glug.Go ahead and put this in.Spanish sherry.Ooh, it smells so good.It smells so sweet.And that's gonna so beawesome to balance outeverything else, I really am excited.I'm gonna let these cool for a secondwhile I get my whisk.Pretty generous pinch, weneed one more, grinded pepper.Chop these spring onions,I wanna make sure they'renot too big of chunks.I'm gonna go ahead and add this inand then I'm gonna whisk it all together.Spring onion vinaigrette is done.We are cooking the Iberico pluma.I'm gonna do exactly whatRosemary told me to do.The Iberico pluma lookskind of like a really,really fancy pork tenderloin.- The Iberico hog or pig isso different than the restbecause the hogs eat so manyacorns and natural things,the fats are really different.And I would just leaveit on the rare side.The range of 135 for this kind of meat.The saffron and the salt together,I would just sprinkle on at the end.The salt, in particular,is really luxurious.- As you can see, it is just absolutelymarbled with this beautiful fatand the color is so brilliant.Drizzle on a little bitof this gorgeous oil.That's even a little much.Okay, just a nice little pinch all over.- When you poke on a piece of raw meat,it leaves a dent.Medium's gonna have some spring back,leaving just a little bit of a dent,well done is gonna be like hard as a rock.What I wanna do is let it rest.It's got some really nicegolden brown color to it.So I have all this excess fat.I'm gonna get rid ofalmost all of it, right?I'll lower the heat so this doesn't burn.Just get my garlic clovesand then I just rough chop.Take a little fresh oil, andthen I'm gonna take my garlicand put it into my pan with that fond.Beautiful fond right there,my garlic is sizzling away,I'm gonna take theleftover beer that I hadand I'm gonna de-glaze.De-glazing is a term wherewe're gonna take a liquid,pour it into the pan to kindastop the garlic from cooking,but it's also gonna lift up thosebeautiful brown bits from the pork chop.And now I'm gonna let this reduce.I turn it up reallyhigh and I kinda scrapeoff all those brown bits sothat they come off the bottom.And that's the base for our sauce.We have a little bit of this thyme,I'm gonna take a little sprig,and throw it into the sauce,we have it in the potatoes,we might as well through it in here.You can see we're gettinga few big bubbles in there,and that's what I want.I want this to bubble away.The fond is off the bottom,if I run my spatula through,there's nothing lefton the bottom of the pan.I'm gonna add my chicken broth,kinda double the amount of beerand I'm gonna let this reduce.Not gonna go heavy on the salt right nowbecause if it reduces andI have too much salt now,it's gonna be way too salty.- We are ready for the grill.The smoke is blowing in my faceand it smells so good,it's like a perfume.I'm gonna leave here and there's gonna bea pack of dogs just chasing methrough the streets.Not gonna touch it, justgonna let it do it's thing.- Potatoes are out of the oven,and all I gotta do isput my pairing knife in,and it comes out nice and clean.I'm gonna run my knife around the edge,just to see how it comes out,give it a little tap, whisper to it.Come on, come out.And a little bit ofpatience prevails, okay?Put some of this cheddar cheese on top,and we're gonna throw it into the boiler.- We're flipping, oh yeah.I'm gonna otherwise let it do its thing.The thing when you grill,you always got to do the little test.Very Spanish, too.[Spanish music]- So the sauce is happilybubbling away, right?I think it's time to add butter.And what this is gonna do,this is gonna help roundour sauce out, a nice flavor,I could take the thyme out now.Most of the leaves stayed on there,it's given its flavor to the sauce.Just gonna add a littleblack pepper to this.Oh, it just blew up on me.Not the pepper master, the salt master.- So let's see where we're at.We're at 130, 31, 32,all right, we're there.And here is the Iberico pluma, all right.- My sauce, I'm gonnaadd a little lemon juiceand then we're gonnastrain everything out.Just the sauce, none of the chunks.So I don't have any seeds in there,there's no pepper, there's no garlic,it's a nice clean sauce.You can see that my carrots,you see that it's gettingkind of thick and syrupy,my carrots are done.And I think we're ready to plate.Just to make this alittle restaurant fancy,I'm gonna take my potato dish,that's nice and brown, and I'mgonna place it on the plate.This is gonna kinda bethe anchor of our dish,it's gonna hold my pork chop upand give it some of thatheight that I'm looking for.- The skin is like crackling.So tender, might be a littlethicker than I should have.We're gonna cut a nice fatwedge, we're winging it.Look at the meat and cheese.You see the layers?- The carrots are nice and glazed.You can see they're shiny.I don't want glaze on my plate.That glaze is a little too sweet.I'm angling my pan away fromme so I don't get that glaze.And I'm just gonna have themkinda peak out the side here.- [Gabi] Let's see, likeI said, I'm no expert.Our vinaigrette over on this side.- [Frank] I've got my pork chop,I'm gonna choose whicheverside looks the nicest,and I think this side looks great.Give my plate a clean.- The saffron finishing salt.What is that, who is she?She is saffron.- I went through a lot of troubleto get this pork chop golden brown,so I'm not gonna take my sauce right nowand dump it over the top.Direct it with our spoon.And that is my pork chop dinner.I hope Gabi likes it.I [mumbles] it up a little,but I think that it might bring backsome memories of grandma, cool.- How can I make this not so ugly?All that work and itlooks stupid on a plate.So like just gonna cleanthe edges of the plate off.I can't wait for Frank to taste it.- Cheers.Hi Gabi, how are you?- Hi, how are you?- Nice to meet you.- It's so nice to meet you.- We're going here.Wow!- Oh, yeah.- It's a little fancier than I thinkthat my gram used to make.I feel like this is alittle taste of Spainand this for me is a little taste of home.How'd I do?- It tastes like a steak.It tastes delicious.- Am I getting in here?- I like it a little rare, butit's so juicy and delicious,the piece of meat, it's just great.The potato, it's got thatbeautiful Iberico ham.The outside is crispy andthe center is kinda creamy,you nailed it, right?You can taste the ham,it doesn't overpower.Great.Taste a little bit of thesmokiness, it's not overpowering,the heat isn't overpoweringfrom the chiles,and that's kinda the idea.I give you an A+, this is good.- A+ from Frank.Frank, what's the bestbite of this pork chop.- The loin is delicious,like I like something closer to the bone,like right here, thislittle nugget of meatthat has fat on it.- Mmm, I love it.- [Frank] Thank you.- I love that it's just likein this gorgeous little mound.Mmm, that is comfort food.- Does it bring you back a little?- My brain just went like 20 years back.They're like twisty, let's eat, wow.- I mean, they're a little sweet'cause there's some brown sugar in there.- I like that.- You know, we have fatty,and then another fattyand then we have somethingthat's a little sweet,I think it helps cut it a little.I'm never gonna be as good of a cookas your grandma, right?'Cause like nobody's as goodof a cook as my grandmother.It's all, and it soundscorny, but it's about love.It's the people you make it for.If you love them, then you're gonnatake good care of them, you know?[people clapping]- That was so much fun.- Can I get a selfie with you?- Oh my gosh, yes!Yay.[bouncy fun music]You don't know this yet,but we have a Halloweencostume planned for you.Do you know what it's gonna be?- What?- So I would really love to grill hot dogswith you while you'rewearing a hotdog costume.- I think that as longas I make my own costume,people will be accepting of it.But I have to make it.[both laughing]