Forget Pickles: This Secret Ingredient Boosts Potato Salad Like No Other!

Throughout the summer, your salad bowl is constantly in use. One day you’re whipping up a tomato-mozzarella salad, the next a tabbouleh, and for the rest of the week, you alternate between Greek, Caesar, and Niçoise salads. Rice, lentils, quinoa, red beans, raw vegetables, and feta… As soon as temperatures rise, you toss together whatever you have on hand to avoid turning on the oven. Yet, your all-time favorite remains the potato salad. Simple, hearty, and always a hit, it appears so often it might as well have its own dedicated bowl. However, after the tenth potato salad of the summer, even your go-to dressing starts to lose its element of surprise. Oil, shallots, fresh herbs, mustard, and pickles: you know the recipe by heart. Luckily, Hervé Palmieri from the @hervecuisine account has discovered the perfect ingredient to revitalize this classic with a fresh and tangy flavor.

For a salad serving 4 to 6 people, Hervé starts by boiling 800 grams of small potatoes (like baby potatoes, Noirmoutier, or fingerlings) with their skins on in a pot of boiling water. While they cook, he thinly slices 3 sweet-and-sour pickles and two stalks of celery, then chops a few sprigs of chives and dill. He places all the ingredients in a mixing bowl, then combines them with 4 hard-boiled eggs, roughly chopped. Once the potatoes are cooked, drained, and peeled, he cuts them into quarters. They are then added to the mixing bowl with the other ingredients.

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But before moving on to the dressing, Hervé always adds a renowned ingredient known for its fresh and tangy taste: a Granny Smith apple, diced. While the pickle adds a vinegary acidity, the Granny Smith apple brightens the salad with its fruity and refreshing flavors. Another benefit: it adds crunch, contrasting with the softness of the potatoes. Next, he prepares a light creamy dressing consisting of 80 grams of mayonnaise, 120 grams of Greek yogurt, 1 tablespoon of mild mustard, 1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar, and some salt and pepper. After mixing these ingredients until the texture is nice and creamy, he pours the dressing over the salad.

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Once all the ingredients are well coated with the dressing, all that’s left is to chill the salad until it’s time to eat. With its tender potatoes, crunchy vegetables, and tangy Granny Smith apple pieces, this classic dish suddenly gets a delightful refresh.