Skip to main content
Main

Potato Salad

A chilled potato salad with a vinegar-based dressing, egg yolks, mustard, and optional celery root.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Potato Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Boil the potatoes in the morning and let them cool before slicing.

Make the dressing

  1. Heat the vinegar in a small pot until boiling.

  2. Beat the egg yolks and pour the hot vinegar over them, stirring until smooth.

  3. Return the mixture to the pot and cook over low heat, stirring constantly until thick.

  4. Remove from heat and stir in the butter.

  5. In a separate bowl, mix the salt, mustard, and cayenne pepper.

  6. Squeeze the lemon juice into the dry mixture and add the minced onion, mixing well.

  7. Combine this mixture with the egg and vinegar mixture, stirring until smooth.

  8. Add the cream and stir until the dressing is thick.

Assemble and serve

  1. Fold in the beaten egg whites just before serving.

  2. Pour the dressing over the sliced potatoes and toss gently with a fork.

  3. Garnish with minced parsley and add finely chopped celery root if desired.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Mustard + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the salad and absorb the dressing as the base.
Egg yolks
Thicken the dressing as they cook and give it a smooth, rich body.
Egg whites
Fold in lightly beaten to add air and a lighter, fluffier texture.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the cooked dressing.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that balances the richness of the eggs and cream.
Cream
Adds body and mildness, further thickening and softening the dressing.

The step that matters

Cooking the egg yolk and vinegar mixture over low heat. Egg yolks thicken as their proteins set, but if they get too hot they can scramble into lumps. Low heat with constant stirring keeps the dressing smooth and thick.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, vinegar, egg, butter, mustard, pepper, onion):

  1. Avocadofits about as well
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Limefits about as well
  4. Mangofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, vinegar, egg, butter, mustard, pepper, onion. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More potato salad recipes

German 31Hot 19Dressing 17Anchovy 15French 10American 9 See all 504 →

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesLemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesPotato RollsPotato Rolls78 recipes