January 17th: Russian Potato Salad

When we had the chalet at Mont Tremblant three years ago, two of our regular guests were a couple, of whom the husband was Russian. During one of these visits, I remember they brought along a Russian potato salad to eat over the course of the weekend. I don’t remember much about the salad, and I didn’t have any of it, but I know there was a discussion about mayonnaise-based salads and I think there were peas in it. It all sounds vague, but I’ve never forgotten this salad. This is the way it is with me and food. In any case, when I came across this recipe for Russian potato salad on smitten kitchen, I decided to give it a go.

First of all, the dressing for the salad is just mayonnaise. That’s it. Immediately, red flags went up. I don’t trust a salad with just mayonnaise for the dressing, even though I have a love-love relationship with my jar of Hellman’s. I was relieved, therefore, that the three little pickles and the red onion that go into the salad meld their flavours with the mayonnaise and take it to a whole other level.

Next, the salad has peas and carrots. I don’t like peas and carrots and can’t imagine what they would be doing in a potato salad. However, they are good for me and my family, and my child likes them, so I added them in. To my immense surprise, I couldn’t taste them, what with the overwhelming mayo-pickle-onion taste. Bonus.

Third, I put in waaaay too much red onion. The recipe calls for one small red onion, finely diced. I had a large one, so used half. I should have used a quarter because it was one potent onion. Then, because I did such a good job of finely dicing it, I had to spend a lot of time digging out minute pieces of onion from Olivia’s plate, and then from mine, because it was even too much onion for me, and that’s saying something. So I recommend using common sense when deciding how much onion to put in this salad. Maybe a half cup.

Despite all of the above, I absolutely loved this salad and I will definitely make it again. This came as a complete and welcome surprise. I recommend you give it a go too!

Served with Chili-coconut Shrimp (thus, the plum sauce in the picture!).