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Blue Cheese and Bacon Potato Salad

"This is a scrumptious combination of a favorite Southern restaurant's green bean side dish and potato salad. It's fabulous and your family will thank you. You can serve it right away, but it does well for a few hours in the fridge. Eat cold or at room temperature."

By allrecipes · From Open Recipes · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and blue cheese share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and 50 recipes mention both. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells apple, fatty. The science ↓

The recipe

6 servings
Prep15 min
Cook30 min

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Put the red potatoes in a large pot, cover with water, add a generous pinch of salt, and bring to a boil. Simmer about 15 minutes until tender when pierced with a knife. Drain and let cool slightly.

  2. Meanwhile, fill a large bowl with the iced water. Boil a pan of water, add the green beans, and cook 2 to 3 minutes until bright green and just tender. Drain and plunge them into the ice water to stop cooking, then drain well.

  3. While the potatoes cook, fry the bacon in a skillet over medium heat 6 to 8 minutes, turning, until crisp. Drain on paper towels, then crumble.

  4. In a small bowl, whisk the white wine vinegar, olive oil, mayonnaise, stone-ground mustard, salt, and black pepper until smooth.

  5. Cut the warm potatoes into halves or quarters and place them in a large bowl. Pour over about two-thirds of the dressing and toss gently so they absorb it.

  6. Add the green beans, crumbled blue cheese, sliced green onions, and most of the bacon to the potatoes. Toss gently, adding the remaining dressing and salt and pepper to taste.

  7. Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes so the flavors meld. Sprinkle with the remaining bacon just before serving.

By allrecipes. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Potato + blue cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together50 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).

  2. Potato + green beanstop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together81 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Vinegar + mustardtop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Potato + olivetop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,688 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Green beans + olivetop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together203 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans,trans-2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

Vinegar and mustard share little aroma chemistry, yet 14,067 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Flavor stand-ins for the green beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, white wine, vinegar, olive, mustard, pepper, blue cheese):

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Tomatobetter flavor fit
  3. Onionbetter flavor fit
  4. Green beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, white wine, vinegar, olive, mustard, pepper, blue cheese. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).