The Never Again Potato Salad

For years, my mom would not tell us how to make her absolutely delicious potato salad. It wasn’t a secret family recipe--she had those, too--she’d just made it so many times that she didn’t look at the recipe anymore and wasn’t sure if the original would come close to her improv version. Then came one year and she made a big batch and it did not taste the way it was “supposed” to taste. We all thought it was good, but I did agree that there was something that was not quite the same as the classic. Later in the summer, (when else do you make potato salad in Canada?) she tried again, but that salad came out different yet again. After a long and deliberated search –is this the one? maybe I got it from this cookbook?--out came the recipe. 

When she made the salad once again with this technical support, the result was closer than the other two editions had been, but still there was a subtle difference. After that, she did not dare to make the salad without the recipe, so never again did we experience the unique combination of flavours that she had so confidently thrown together in the past. I have this version of the recipe, the Slightly Less Than Perfect Original Potato Salad, and every time I make it I try to imagine what the illusive missing ingredients are that made up the long remembered dish from my childhood. So many of my recipes are my mother’s and since she passed away a year ago, I am constantly cooking with her beside me. Sometimes it is lovely to have her there; sometimes it is still too fresh and painful.  I can’t help but think how brief and elusive a loved one’s life can be; full of flavours often so subtle you cannot taste them all at the time and yet you can savour so much as time passes.

Slightly Less Than Perfect Original Potato Salad

6 potatoes, peeled and boiled

2 eggs, hard boiled and chopped, reserving a few “coins” for the top

1 stalk of celery, chopped

½ cup chopped cucumber

½ white onion, or 3 green onions, chopped

Dressing:

½ cup light mayo

1/3 cup yogurt

2 tbsp cider vinegar

2 tbsp Dijon

2 tbsp honey

Celery seed (to taste)

While potatoes are still warm from boiling, sprinkle cider vinegar on them to keep from turning brown. Make dressing while potatoes are boiling and let sit in fridge. Add all ingredients; best eaten the next day.

2010