This recipe doesn't use a lot in the way of measurements. It's another one that you just eyeball. If you are using a lot of potatoes, then of course you'll increase the other ingredients. If you are using just a few potatoes, then cut the ingredients a bit. It's hard to mess this recipe up. Aim for a nice consistency for the dressing portion of the potato salad and it should taste just fine.
Potatoes--your choice; I used 8 large baking potatoes
Hard boiled eggs--your choice; I used 10; 7 to cut up and put in the potato salad and 3 for decoration
Dressing mix:
Miracle Whip (or you can use mayo with a splash of vinegar, which is what I usually do)
dill pickle juice
mustard
onion flakes (optional; I don't use it)
salt and pepper to taste
dill weed
Topping:
Eggs--2 or 3 hard-boiled eggs, neatly sliced
dill weed or paprika for color, or you can also throw in radishes for extra color and flavor.
Potato salad isn't that hard to make; it's like bread, it just takes some time since you have to boil eggs and cook the potatoes in advance. But it's easy enough to boil eggs and easy enough to pop a bunch of potatoes in the oven and let them bake for a while. The remainder of the recipe is a breeze after these two parts are accomplished.
So, go ahead and get your potatoes baking (if you plan ahead, you can throw extra baked potatoes in the oven some night and already have this step finished).
Also, get those eggs boiled up. I put my eggs in a pot of cold water, bring the water to a boil, then shut off the burner and allow the eggs to cook (covered) there for the next 15 minutes. At that point, it's time to drain the hot water off the eggs and add cold water and some ice cubes to stop the cooking process. This way you end up with nice, yellow yolks as opposed to the greenish-tinged yolks.
Once the eggs are cooled off, of course you peel them!
Once your potatoes have baked and cooled, then you remove the peel from them as well.
Yes, you may boil your potatoes if you prefer to do that as opposed to baking them. But I have found that there is a small window between when your potatoes will be too hard and when they will become too soft to use. Baking them gives me the consistency that I'm looking for.
Next, you want to cut up the potatoes into bite-sized pieces. I typically slice the potato twice, lengthwise so that you're getting about four equal-sized pieces each time you slice through the potato.
Once you get your potatoes sliced, you then chop up the eggs that you are going to put in the salad. At that point, you add the 3 main ingredients.
I usually begin with a large spoonful of mayo (don't forget to add that splash of vinegar for a better taste!). Then I'll squeeze a fair amount of mustard on top of the mayo and mix it up a bit to get an idea of the dressing consistency. If the potatoes still seem a little dry, I might add a bit more mayo or I'll pour in the pickle juice. Better to add a little than a lot; you can always add more, but you can't take ingredients out once you've mixed them in! Once you're happy with the consistency, you can then add the remaining ingredients. For me, that would be the salt, pepper, and dill weed.
I usually prepare my potato salad in a large bowl and then transfer it to my serving dish so I don't have such messy looking sides of the bowl. Once you have your potato salad in the bowl you plan to serve it in, you can now add the garnishes. For me, that includes the remaining 3 eggs as well as a little extra dill weed sprinkled across the top.
Cover and refrigerate until well-chilled. Serve as a side dish to your favorite meal. My favorite main course to pair this with is grilled pork chops. Stay tuned for my easy 2-ingredient pork chop marinade, which will be posted very soon!
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