German Potato Salad

[PrincessFiona]

I'm sorry that I didn't see this sooner.

Tell your friend that there is no "not german" potato salad! LOL

I think the differences are regional. In some areas, they make potato salad with bacon and onions...I'm sure that the mayo, eggs, dill relish is from some area too. Thomas enjoys that kind of potato salad and thinks of it as German (Don't all Germans think of everything that they like as being German? LOL)

I can promise you that the kind that you made with the vinegar is also ... German.


Here is our potato salad from Southern Germany:

(my amounts are estimations)

~1kg potatoes. I used the yukon gold kind because they withstand the boiling, peeling and then slicing
~1 onion
~250 ml of prepared vegetable base (you can buy the base in the soup section in little jars and prepare it with hot water)
~1-10 tsp of red wine vinegar (depends on how you feel about vinegar. Thomas loves it ... the more the merrier)
~3 tbsp. of oil
~1 cucumber
~salt and pepper to taste

Basically, you boil the potatoes for 30 min or so until they are cooked completely through. If it's cold outside you can put them out on the porch to cool (This will also make you feel very German!) ... or just pour the hot water down the sink and add cold water to the potatoes. Peel them (they should peel easily) and slice them into fairly thin pieces (mine tend to crumble...I don't have German genes). You put the sliced potatoes into a big serving bowl. Peel and dice your onion and add it to the potatoes. Peel the cucumber and slice it very thin (as in you can see through the slices thin...yah, whatevah....). Add them to the potatoes and onions in the bowl.

Mix the vegetable base (my mil loves to use beef base just so she knows that she has put some meat into my vegetarian daughter! LOL) with the vinegar, oil, salt and pepepr.

Add the sauce to the potato mixture and let it sit for 30 min-1 hour so that the flavors come together.

There are a lot of variations.

Some people add a teaspoon of mustard to this...not American mustard though. The closest you can buy here outside of German American Deli is Dijonaise, I think. As I mentioned before, others add bacon and even tomato.

There is no wrong German potato salad (you know...unless you cut cucumbers into slices that are too thick...like me...and your mil has to stand over you and re-cut each slice individually until it is paper-thin)!

I wish I had seen this before...but then I would also have encouraged you to make a "very good but not German" unless you live in the South of Germany LOL potato salad!

Kris

[houseelf]

Kris, I know I've said this before but seriously, my family would cry with joy if you cooked for them.

[poky]

My MIL cracks me up. I sent her an email asking her how she makes potato salad, because a friend was wanting a German recipe. She wrote it out on a piece of paper and snail-mailed it to me. I guess reading emails is OK, but replying to them is too hard?

hers has red potatoes, onion, dill pickle, celery, vinegar, salad oil, chicken broth, salt, pepper, and parsley. "enjoy luke warm, or day 2 with a T of mayo or sour cream. Decorate with hard boiled eggs."

She's also from northern Germany (Harz region, Niedersachsen).

[medpedspouse]

My MIL cracks me up. I sent her an email asking her how she makes potato salad, because a friend was wanting a German recipe. She wrote it out on a piece of paper and snail-mailed it to me. I guess reading emails is OK, but replying to them is too hard?

hers has red potatoes, onion, dill pickle, celery, vinegar, salad oil, chicken broth, salt, pepper, and parsley. "enjoy luke warm, or day 2 with a T of mayo or sour cream. Decorate with hard boiled eggs."

She's also from northern Germany (Harz region, Niedersachsen).

Hee, hee. Tell her thank you. I will have to try Kris' and your MIL's and see if I get closer to the way my friend's mom made it. He is so blunt but gets away with it because he has such a big heart...so, I am determined to make "THE RIGHT" potato salad. LOL