Karl and Angela Rees

German Potato Salad

Sun, 01/06/2008 - 20:40 — Karl Rees

Summary

Yield	8
Source	Karl's Grandmother Nissen, as modified by Karl's Mom and by Karl himself
Prep Time	2 hours
Tags	Side dish Potatoes

Description

This is Karl's traditional German potato salad, as passed down to him from his mother and grandmother (with modifications by Karl). He's had it almost every Christmas Eve since he was born, and loves to make it for just about any occasion.

Ingredients

6 potatoes
8 eggs
8 baby dill pickles
6 sli bacon
1⁄3 c diced onion
2 t distilled white vinegar
1 c oil
1 red wine vinegar
1 black pepper
1 salt

Instructions

Dice & boil 6 medium-sized potatoes (preferably, leave the peels on). For better taste, use 10 small red potatoes instead. Boil for approximately 30 minutes, or until soft enough that a fork can penetrate the potato with ease, but not so soft that the potato splits from the fork.
Boil 4 eggs.
Cook 6 slices of bacon.
Drain potatoes. Immediately place in a large bowl. While tossing the potatoes, generously sprinkle red wine vinegar and freshly ground black pepper over the potatoes, adding also a pinch of salt. Let sit for 15 minutes.
Dice boiled eggs and cooked bacon. Also dice 6 baby dill pickles, and 1/3 cup onion. Baby kosher dill pickles and red onion are preferable, but any other type of pickle or onion may be used.
Add diced eggs, bacon, pickles, and onion to potatoes.
While tossing the potatoes, slowly add the mayonnaise mixture (see below).
Let chill in refrigerator for a few hours, preferably overnight.

Mayonnaise

This is very tricky--I often end up doing it twice. An easier version of the mayonnaise is decribed after this. Put 4 egg yolks & 2 tsp. distilled white vinegar into blender. Begin mixing at slow speed. After half a minute, while mixing, slowly add 1 cup of oil (prerably olive, but I often use vegetable oil instead) until the mixture is thick. The resulting mixture should be creamy, but still liquid enough that it pours out of the blender. About the consistency of molasses.

Notes

Easy Version of Mayonnaise (no raw eggs)

Mix one cup of standard mayonnaise (you are absolutely forbidden to use miracle whip or light mayonnaise--preferably stick with Kraft) with 2 tsp. distilled white vinegar. While hand-mixing the mayonnaise, slowly add olive oil until the mixture is about the consistency of salad dressing. I suspect that this requires about 1/3 to 1/2 cup oil, but I have not verified that this is exactly how much I end up putting in.

Variations

Add chives and/or celery. Don't add bacon. Add mustard to the mayonniase mixture.

Note that the required amount of potatoes, pickles, onions, and eggs, is all just a guess on my part--I typically just do whatever "looks right."