CLASSIC POTATO SALAD

[JENNYBEEAY]

CAN ANYONE RECOMMEND A RECIPE FOR A SIMPLE, CLASSIC POTATO SALAD LIKE GRANDMA USED TO MAKE? I'VE FOUND MANY RECIPES BUT THEY ALL SEEM TO HAVE MOVED AWAY FROM THE ONE I USED TO HAVE AT FAMILY PICNICS. THANKS FOR YOUR SUGGESTIONS!

[Uncle Bob]

Baked potatoes......
Eggs........
Dukes Mayonnaise........
Very Small amount of Mustard...(Sometimes Creole)
Chopped Garlic Dill Pickle........
A little Finely Chopped Onion & Celery........
Salt/Pepper.......

[LauraGrace]

You bake your potatoes? I'm intrigued. Is there an advantage to this? It seems like you'd have to add a LOT more mayo (I mean, it's Duke's, so how bad can THAT be, right?) to compensate for the drier, fluffier texture.

[Uncle Bob]

To be honest I don't know if I can give you an 'advantage' per se..Just what we always do. Bake..Cool.. Peel...Dice and prepare the salad....More Dukes?? Not that I've noticed.
Sometimes it's Bake..Cool...Dice with out peeling and prepare salad. It's called Baked Potato Salad...

Give it a try and........

Enjoy!

[Rick]

If you do a mayo based one, I always like to add yellow mustard.

[sedimental]

Seems like there are many different "classics"....LOL
My family classic is Best Foods mayo, DILL pickles, No mustard....and of course the onions, touch of garlic, lots of egg, a bit of celery and lots of S & P.

[waitress]

My grandma used to make her potato salad whipped, kind of like mash potatoes. Every Thanksgiving I ask my aunt to make it for me, my mom packs it in a cooler for a four hour drive. It's a basic recipe, mayo,mustard, course chopped boiled eggs, pickles, onion, salt, pepper garnished with paprika.
One tweak that I do now, I put bread & butter pickles & cornichons in the food processor and sometimes capers, (gasp, so not southern).

[c oliver]

That is perhaps the most interesting riff on a "classic" that I've ever heard of. But you forgot to mention the Jim Beam :)

[steakman55]

Duke's mayo is best one to use....no sugar.....great taste.

[gordeaux]

By the way, I'm a chopped dill pickle person for tater salad.

Never sweet pickles though. I don't think a mixture of potato, onion, egg, and mayo needs sugar added.

[Full tummy]

Me, too. What's potato salad without the pickles?

[grampart]

"What's potato salad without the pickles?" Same as tuna salad without the pickles. Better!

[Will Owen]

To itch his own. I like to add chopped dill pickle sometimes, to both potato and tuna salad, but I do NOT like the sweet pickle relish that's so popular.

Mustard is another addition I do not favor.

[Full tummy]

Yes, definitely no sweet relish in any of that stuff. A bottle of sweet relish sits in my fridge for an age without getting used.

[Will Owen]

Were I alone, I probably wouldn't even have any, but Mrs. O wants it in macaroni salad and coleslaw, and on hot dogs as well. So it gets used at just the frequency to keep it from growing fur...

[Full tummy]

Hahahahaha. Funny but misguided. It is the same as a burger--better with the pickles.

[Channa]

To me, this is how potato salad should taste -- creamy, eggy, and lovely:

http://apps.detnews.com/apps/recipes/...

(I do usually double the amount of onion.)

[Will Owen]

They had me until I came to the mustard...

Mom's classic (THE family recipe) formula: 1 egg to 1 potato to 1/4 onion. S&P as needed or wanted, Hellman's (BF) mayonnaise to bind. I've monkeyed with it, added sour cream, added garlic, whatever, but the ONLY way I've been able to improve it has been to make the mayonnaise. When I do that, then I incorporate some garlic by dropping it into the running Cuisinart and then proceeding with the rest.

An improvement I will be making is a trick I learned from that Greek etc. cookbook I've been so crazy about: to keep the onion's sweetness and crunch without the bite, put the sliced-up onion into a bowl, sprinkle it with salt, and then cover with cold water for at least half an hour. Drain and dry thoroughly and then proceed. Lovely trick.

[c oliver]

You know I love that Greek potato salad and the onion technique is great.

[catrn]

Great tip! I will definately try this next time I make potato salad.

[Will Owen]

Anecdote re: Mediterranean taste: when my sister's family was living near Brindisi in southern Italy and mom and I visited, we were invited to lunch at a neighbor's house and served a typical working-class special-occasion meal of several overlapping courses. Mom decided to reciprocate with an equally typical American picnic meal of fried chicken, green salad and potato salad. The latter was politely but firmly declined after first bites, because the Italians couldn't tolerate so much raw onion. Had we known about and employed the soaking technique they probably would have eaten and enjoyed that salad.

[Gio]

This is a link to the Bon Appetit Y'All first thread and my report of a delicious potato salad. Very easy to make. Directly following the report is a post by the author of the book, Virginia Willis:
http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/6078...

[clamscasino]

I heartlily second Gio's recomendation! Easy to make and soooo delicious.

[gordeaux]

boil some diced potatoes
dice up some celery
dice up some boiled egg
dice up some onion
Add real mayo - not some sugary glop "salad dressing" like Miracle Whip. Add enough to make it the consistency of what YOU like.
Salt and Pepper to taste
If you like garlic, go for it
If you like parsley, go for it.

Potato salad is not a recipe that random people will know how to make according to your family picnics. We weren't there.

I have no idea if your family used diced or sliced potatoes.

I have no idea if your family used homemade mayo, or some storebought stuff, or if you guys actually preferred your potato salad to be sugary and used Miracle Whip.

You were there. It's basically potatoes, onions, usually a little celery and mayo. What do YOU remember? If you don't remember, then thereshould be no issue with a new recipe since you don't have anything to compare it to.
Find a recipe and then TWEAK it to what YOU want.

[grampart]

I use all of the ingredients above (Vidalia onion) except the garlic and, for salt, I use celery salt. I find it adds that certain something.

[todao]

Except for the sugar and tomatoes (I don't use either one) this recipe is pretty close to what my family has used since I was a kid. I don't follow a recipe, I just make it, but if I did use a family "recipe" this would be the foundation I'd work from along with some chopped green and/or black olives, chopped garlic, green onions for the chopped onion, Best Foods or Hellman's' mayonnaise (no substitutes for that ingredient) red wine vinegar, chopped hard boiled eggs, chopped parsley, and some crisp bacon bits sprinkled on top.

http://southernfood.about.com/od/pota...

[c oliver]

Here's a whole slew of ideas:

http://search.chow.com/search?query=p...