tater salad

When I was a kid I decided that I liked potato salad. This was because all the times I had potato salad I liked it. Of course, every time I had it my mom had made it. When I started trying restaurant and grocery store potato salad I realized that there was quite a difference between homemade and store bought.

In the past few years I came to the conclusion that I should know how to make a few things that might be taken to parties, so I asked my mom about how she made her potato salad. She gave me an outline of how she made it and I combined what she gave me with another recipe I found and edited the whole thing to my taste.

I have learned two things about making potato salad through this process. First, no matter what a recipe says, vinegar almost always damages the flavor of the potato salad. Second, it is hard to put too much salt into the salad.

I personally like the potato salad a lot, but that is because it has been created specifically to my tastes. I have had a few compliments, though on some occasions I think the compliments were people just being nice because some of the versions of the salad as I refined the recipe have been a bit off. Golden gave the potato salad her ultimate compliment by telling me, "It didn't make me gag." Apparently she doesn't like potato salad.

I was asked for the recipe yesterday, though, so I decided to include it as a post. Understand that what follows relies a lot on guestimating how much of each ingredient to put into the concoction.

The ingredients that you will need:

• Eight medium-sized potatoes
• A quarter cup of vegetable oil (or canola, or olive...)
• A quarter cup of lemon juice
• Some salt
• Mayonnaise or Miracle Whip (Approximately two cups)
• Some mustard
• Four eggs
• Two stalks of celery
• Two chopped dill pickles or four teaspoons of dill relish

Start by boiling the potatoes until they can be easily punctured by a fork. Depending on the amount of water and the size of the potatoes, this can take from fifteen minutes to forty minutes. It is better to overcook than to undercook.

While the potatoes are boiling I chop the celery and store it for future use. If you are using pickles rather than relish, chop this right now as well.

Once the potatoes are done boiling and I have drained the water, I peel and chop the potatoes. The resulting size of the chopped potato pieces is at the discretion of the cook.

Mix the chopped potatoes with the oil, lemon juice, and some salt (between five and ten seconds of continuous shaking from a salt shaker). This adds a little flavor to the potatoes, but also reduces how much mayonnaise the potatoes will absorb.

Hard boil the eggs. I bring the water to a boil, then simmer for twenty minutes. If you are using separate pots to boil the potatoes and the eggs you can do these steps at the same time.

Once the eggs are boiled, remove the shells and dice.

Now add everything that has not been added yet. Give two good squirts from the mustard bottle (this replaces the need for vinegar, but does not taste as severe). Add the egg, celery, and relish (or chopped pickle) as well. Finally add a couple of very large glops of mayonnaise or Miracle Whip (maybe one and a half cups) and mix everything up.

Test the taste, but try testing a piece of potato rather than a piece of celery or relish. The potato is going to be more indicative of the taste of the salad.

It is very likely that the results will taste like a bland, acidic, and/or tangy version of potato salad. If the potato salad tastes bland, generously add more salt. If the potato salad tastes acidic or tangy, generously add more mayo or Miracle Whip. Eventually the masterpiece is complete. Refrigerate and serve cold.

That is all there is to it. Enjoy.