Sara's potato salad, June 2011
My mother-in-law was a Minnesota farm wife who year after year cheerfully and tirelessly fed her large family and guests with hearty, satisfying meals, which usually included potatoes. She made wonderful, rich, fluffy mashed potatoes and a mean potato salad. She wrote out the recipes for me, and although I don’t know what happened to the mashed potato recipe, I recently ran across the one for potato salad. It got rave reviews when I made it for a recent potluck, and it brought back happy memories of her and countless family gatherings.
Mom Beran’s secret ingredient in the potato salad was sour cream or heavy cream. I think her special trick was to blend the dressing ingredients and adjust the balance of vinegar, sugar, and salt before adding other ingredients. This way no matter what the ratio of ingredients in the mayonnaise—which can vary from brand to brand—her salad always had the right blend of flavors.
| Sara's Potato Salad | Print |
- 4 medium potatoes
- 4 eggs
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 1/2 cup sour cream or heavy cream
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 tablespoon prepared mustard
- Vinegar (as needed)
- 2 tablespoons onion, finely chopped
- 1/4 cup celery, fine dice
- Cook scrubbed, unpeeled potatoes in boiling water until tender but still slightly firm, and allow to cool.
- Hard-boil eggs; cool and remove shells.
- In a large bowl mix mayonnaise, sour cream or heavy cream, salt, sugar, and mustard. Now taste it. Some mayonnaise needs a little extra salt, sugar, or vinegar. The flavors will be strong, but this gives a sense of the flavor balance.
- Stir in onion and celery. Quarter and slice eggs and add. Peel and slice potatoes into approximately 12-inch pieces and add. Gently fold all ingredients together.
- Cover and refrigerate at least 3 hours to allow flavors to blend.
Thanks for this an amazing recipe !