COVID-19 is kicking into a different gear here in Texas. That means people are gonna need some comfort food. One of the greatest comfort foods is old-fashioned potato salad. Here is the recipe for my mother’s potato salad. I have only altered it a bit.
Ingredients
- 5 lbs russet potatoes, peeled and cut in quarters
- yellow mustard
- Miracle Whip (my mother used Hellman’s mayonnaise – this is my one variation)
- one large purple onion, diced
- five kosher pickle spears, diced
- pickle juice
- six hard boiled eggs, diced
- salt and pepper to taste
This is a simple dish, but the procedure matters. The hardest part is peeling the potatoes. Boil them in a large pot until they can be easily stuck with a fork. Drain them.
Put the onion in the bottom of the pot you cooked the potatoes in. Then put the potatoes on top of the onion. This little bit of heat blanches the onions a bit which makes the dish savory and keeps the onions from being too crunch.
Mash the potatoes directly into the onions with a potato masher. Don’t work at this too hard. If this is difficult, you didn’t boil your potatoes long enough. Just break them up nicely. When that is finished, add the mustard. I just squirt it all over the top without any measurement. The mustard gives zing, but the main job here is coloring. However yellow you want your potato salad will tell you how much mustard you want. I know I can add more later, so I play this conservatively.
Add one large spoonful of the Miracle Whip. Again, I don’t measure, but this comes to about a quarter of a cup. In my opinion, you really can’t use too much, so don’t fret.
The real magic is the next step — add two tablespoons (I just eyeball it) of pickle juice. You can’t get enough pickles in dish to give it enough pickle flavor. You need the juice. Throw in salt and pepper as you desire. I use kosher salt and fresh ground pepper.
Use a mixer (I have an ancient 5-speed electric hand mixer) to blend all these ingredients up. When they are well balanced, taste it. Now is the time to add more pickle juice, mustard, Miracle Whip, or salt and pepper. Make it the way you like it. After adding what was lacking, mix it a little more until it is thoroughly blended.
Throw in your sliced pickles and eggs and stir them by hand with a large wooden spoon. When finished stirring, lick the spoon!
Some people prefer to eat this hot. Mrs. Greenbean is one of those people. I usually pull out a bowl for her to eat right then. I like it cold, so I make it the day before I want it. On July 4th, I serve potato salad, so July 3rd always finds me in the kitchen. It is the perfect dish for a picnic, a large gathering, potluck, or in these COVID-19 days it makes us feel all good inside. It pairs nicely with barbecue, hot dogs, fried chicken, asparagus or fruit. When coupled with a slice of white bread, it makes for a meal all by itself.