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German Potato Salad

A salad of cold boiled potatoes with bacon, mustard, sugar, vinegar, and onions, served warm or cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

German Potato Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. Fry the diced bacon in a skillet until the grease is rendered but the bacon is not too hard.

  2. In a bowl, mix the flour, dry mustard, sugar, salt, and white pepper.

  3. Sprinkle the mixture into the skillet with the bacon, ensuring the grease is not too hot.

  4. When the mixture thickens, add the vinegar and water, stirring well.

  5. Let it boil until thick, then pour it over the cold boiled diced potatoes and chopped onion.

  6. Stir the mixture well.

Serve

  1. Serve warm or cold, garnished with finely minced parsley.

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

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

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Mustard + potatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

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

  5. Mustard + vinegartop 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

Bacon
Rendered fat carries flavor and gives the dressing a savory, smoky taste.
Flour
Thickens the dressing as it cooks with the fat and liquid.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances the sugar.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharp vinegar.
Potatoes
Form the body of the salad and soak up the warm dressing.

The step that matters

Sprinkling the flour mixture into the bacon fat. If the fat is too hot, the flour can scorch or clump instead of blending smoothly. Keeping the fat moderate lets the flour cook into a smooth, even base before the liquid goes in.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, mustard, sugar, vinegar, potato, onion, parsley):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, mustard, sugar, vinegar, potato, onion, parsley. 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.

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