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In this edition of Epicurious 101, professional chef and chef instructor Frank Proto demonstrates how to make the ultimate potato salad to serve at a backyard barbecue or bring to your next pot luck.Get our recipe: Perfectly Creamy Potato Salad
Transcript
00:00 I'm Frank Proto, professional chef and culinary instructor,
00:02 and today I'm gonna show you
00:03 how to make the best potato salad.
00:05 This recipe is simple and quick.
00:07 You don't need a lot of ingredients.
00:08 You can do this, I promise.
00:11 This is potato salad 101.
00:13 Potato salad comes in a lot of different forms.
00:18 Everyone has their own preference.
00:20 My perfect potato salad is the way
00:22 that my grandmother used to make it.
00:23 It is very simple, but it is extremely delicious.
00:27 It's boiled potatoes, a Yukon Gold to me
00:30 is one of the best waxy potatoes.
00:32 It holds its shape.
00:33 It has great flavor and texture.
00:36 For the most part, waxy potatoes like a Yukon Gold
00:38 don't get fluffy.
00:39 They get more of like a kind of a creamy texture
00:42 when you cook them,
00:42 which is exactly what you want for a good potato salad.
00:45 I always start out with cold water.
00:47 My potatoes are washed.
00:48 I scrub the skins.
00:49 I know you've had waterlogged potatoes.
00:51 They're wet, they're squishy, and it's not good.
00:53 I find if you leave the skins on,
00:55 you kind of have that jacket on them
00:56 and the potatoes don't get waterlogged.
00:58 So potatoes into cold water, turn it on.
01:00 If we boil the potatoes the whole time,
01:03 they kind of jump around the pan and they get beat up.
01:05 The skins come off.
01:06 We lose a lot of starch.
01:08 So let it come to a boil and then lower it to a simmer.
01:11 It's probably gonna take about 35 to 40 minutes
01:14 to cook these potatoes.
01:15 So you gotta be patient.
01:17 Sometimes people will wanna put salt into this water.
01:19 I stay away from that.
01:20 If I have peeled potatoes in the water,
01:23 I will salt the water because the salt's actually
01:25 gonna get into the potato.
01:26 Here, I have the skins on so salt's not getting in.
01:29 I'm also gonna rinse these potatoes
01:31 and chill them down under cold water
01:33 so that rinsing and chilling is gonna wash off
01:35 any seasoning anyway.
01:37 So I choose not to salt the water.
01:39 Potatoes have been in the pot simmering away happily
01:41 for about 20, 25 minutes.
01:44 And now what I like to do is add my eggs.
01:46 We egg need about 10, 12 minutes.
01:48 So I'm gonna put my eggs in.
01:49 The potatoes and the eggs will be done at the same time.
01:52 And they all cook happily away together.
01:55 Now we wait.
01:56 You can see that I have a little bit
01:57 of falling apart potatoes,
01:59 but they're not shredding and falling apart.
02:01 Now, how do I know the potatoes are done, right?
02:03 This is a raw potato.
02:04 If I stab this raw potato, what happens?
02:07 It doesn't fall off.
02:10 It holds on real tight.
02:11 But if I stab a potato that is mostly cooked,
02:16 it slips right off of my paring knife.
02:18 And that's what I want.
02:19 It should slip off my paring knife.
02:21 It should not fall apart.
02:23 These are perfect.
02:24 Let's drain them.
02:25 I got my potatoes in the pot.
02:26 I've run some cold water over them.
02:28 So they're easy to handle.
02:29 And as a chef, I might wanna ice these down.
02:32 And that's okay.
02:32 If you have the ice and you wanna do it,
02:34 I'm gonna let them cool so that I can handle them.
02:37 And then we can finish the salad.
02:38 So now all I really wanna do is peel everything
02:43 and get into my bowl.
02:44 I'm not gonna use a cutting board.
02:45 I have a bowl for all my waste.
02:47 I have a bowl that my salad's gonna go into.
02:49 I get a paring knife.
02:50 Just remember these are cooled off
02:52 and I can hold them in my hand without being uncomfortable.
02:54 If they're still hot,
02:55 you can always put them in a towel and peel them.
02:58 But for the most part,
02:59 I like to cool them so they're easy to peel.
03:01 I can tell that this potato is cooked right on the money
03:04 because the outside is not kind of shredding
03:07 and falling apart.
03:08 And then when I stick my knife through,
03:10 it just has a little bit of resistance.
03:12 So what I like to do is cut my potato in half,
03:15 and a half again,
03:17 and then just into nice chunks.
03:20 Potatoes are cut.
03:21 Now we can peel the eggs.
03:22 And what I like to do with eggs
03:23 is just kind of bang them on the table.
03:27 There's almost always a little air gap in one side,
03:30 and that always helps your eggs peel better.
03:32 And then we peel.
03:34 Eggs are really difficult to peel
03:35 while they're still super hot.
03:37 You should always cool them down a little.
03:38 And then this membrane separates away from the egg,
03:41 and they're a lot easier to peel.
03:42 So not cold, not hot,
03:45 but somewhere in between,
03:47 and these shells come off like a dream.
03:50 My eggs are peeled,
03:51 and I have a really great trick on how to chop these up.
03:53 No fuss, no muss.
03:55 Get yourself a resting rack,
03:57 put it on top,
03:58 take your egg,
03:59 smash it through.
04:02 Look at our eggs are chopped.
04:03 Potato salad for egg salad.
04:05 This is the right way to do it.
04:07 It's super quick and efficient.
04:09 I am going to save two eggs for garnish.
04:11 I'm just gonna slice them on top,
04:13 but chopping eggs couldn't be any simpler than that.
04:19 Time to make our salad.
04:20 The ingredients for this salad is super simple.
04:23 It's just potatoes, eggs, olives, mayonnaise, and vinegar.
04:26 Of course, salt and pepper.
04:28 So you kind of gotta get these right.
04:30 So you have to taste as you go.
04:31 So I'm gonna start out with just a little bit
04:33 of black pepper, not a lot,
04:36 and a decent amount of salt.
04:37 Remember, there's no salt in this yet.
04:39 I'm using kosher salt.
04:40 Whenever I salt things,
04:41 people think that I'm over-salting,
04:43 but kosher salt has big flakes.
04:45 You can see them better.
04:46 So it looks like I'm putting a lot of salt in, but I'm not.
04:49 Distilled vinegar.
04:50 You could be tempted to use fancy vinegar for this.
04:53 I want white distilled.
04:54 It's got a clean flavor.
04:56 It's nice and acidic.
04:58 I put in about a quarter cup, maybe a little less,
05:00 and I like to put that over the potatoes
05:02 before I put the mayonnaise on,
05:04 just for the fact that the potatoes will soak it up.
05:06 So now I'm just gonna kind of give it a little toss
05:09 with that salt, pepper, and vinegar.
05:11 I have some of these green olives with pimento in them.
05:13 I think it adds some color, a little pop of salt.
05:15 I'm just gonna add these whole
05:17 and save some on the side for garnish later,
05:20 just to kind of stud on top.
05:22 Last but not least is mayonnaise.
05:24 I like Hellmann's.
05:25 A good prepared mayonnaise is key here.
05:27 Do not use Miracle Whip.
05:29 Miracle Whip is gross.
05:31 Throw it out the window.
05:32 Mayonnaise every single time.
05:34 And you don't wanna be shy with this.
05:36 You wanna make sure that there's enough mayonnaise
05:38 that you don't have a dry potato salad.
05:41 You want it to be dressed really well.
05:43 So at this point, we just kind of give it a little toss.
05:47 What's gonna happen is as this salad sits,
05:50 it will soak up some of that mayonnaise.
05:52 So you might have to readjust
05:54 after it sits for a little while,
05:56 but I want it to be nice and creamy and delicious.
05:58 Make sure the egg is studded through.
06:01 I think that's good on the mayonnaise for now.
06:03 I'm gonna test the salt and pepper in this.
06:06 Just get a piece of potato.
06:07 Good.
06:11 I'm tasting potatoes.
06:11 I'm tasting a little vinegar.
06:13 It definitely needs a little more salt.
06:15 It definitely needs just a little more mayonnaise.
06:17 Finish mixing it up.
06:18 It's not making that sound.
06:20 It's not good.
06:21 Let me give it another little taste.
06:24 I think we're good there.
06:27 We're gonna leave it alone.
06:29 It's on the money.
06:30 Time to plate it up.
06:34 It's simple.
06:35 It's potato salad.
06:36 It's a side.
06:37 It's not gonna be too fancy.
06:38 Get yourself a nice heaping mound of potato salad.
06:43 Get it in there.
06:44 Don't be shy.
06:46 I'm gonna stud it with a couple of olives.
06:48 And then I like to just take slices of the egg
06:52 and kind of just put that around.
06:54 A little bit of that yolk crumbling.
06:56 And there you have it, everyone.
06:57 That is my potato salad.
06:58 Let's give it a taste.
07:00 Get a nice piece of potato in there.
07:02 Make sure you get it nice and dressed.
07:04 Potatoes are perfectly cooked.
07:08 They have a little bit of bite to them.
07:10 Crumbly on the outside.
07:11 The olives have a nice salty pop.
07:13 It's creamy.
07:14 It's eggy.
07:15 Every time I try it, I'm that little boy
07:17 back on Long Island, my grandmother serving this up.
07:19 And that's part of why this is so wonderful.
07:21 It's a great potato salad,
07:22 but then I get to think about my grandma.
07:24 (electronic music)