This is how to make Southern potato salad recipe, a leader for over 30 years. It’s easy step-by-step. Also, this is part of our Salads, Potatoes, Sides, Vegetables, Game Day, Holidays, Christmas, & Thanksgiving Categories. Also, see it in our BBQ Burger Sides, Thanksgiving Dinner Meals Ideas, Holiday Dinner Suggestions, & Christmas Dinner Meals ideas articles.
Southern Potato Salad Recipe Ingredients
Fortunately, the Southern potato salad ingredients are common and simple. Also, they pair perfectly and are balanced to avoid any single ingredient from becoming overwhelming.
- The main ingredient is the potato. Russet is preferred but I’ve also made this with red potatoes and new potatoes.
- The other ingredients are fresh veggies like celery, red onion, & sweet pickles (or dill pickles or sweet pickle relish). Generally, these are all diced vegetables.
- Finally, hard-boiled eggs, mayo, salt, black pepper, and paprika are the last ingredients. Salt is also used when boiling the cutup potatoes.
Overview of How To Make Southern Potato Salad
Perform these steps in this order.
- Make the hardboiled eggs. Then, peel & chop up into a mixing bowl.
- Peel, cutup, cook, and drain potatoes.
- Combine the diced veggies, chopped eggs, spices, & mayo into a mixing bowl.
- Fold in the pared, cooked potatoes.
- Then, cover and put in the fridge for at least 2-3 hours.
How To Make Southern Potato Salad Recipe Variations
Southern potato salad recipe variations are very easy to make. With all the popular ways of making potato salad, there isn’t much to change it to shift the focus to completely alter the flavor you want to have. Keep ready to see the alternatives.
Southern DILL Potato Salad
To make Southern Dill Potato Salad, follow these recipe changes.
- Replace the Gherkins pickles with any form of Dill pickles. They can be hamburger dill slices or dill pickle spears, for example. And they’re still to be diced. 6 Gherkins equals about 3 Tablespoons diced dill pickles.
- Also, add in 1 teaspoon of Dill. This can be dill weed, ground dill, or dill seed. Read more from Organic Facts about the “11 Health Benefits of Dill“.
Southern EGG Potato Salad
To make Southern Egg Potato Salad, follow these simple recipe changes.
- Firstly, add in 4 more eggs.
- Then, have 1 less potato.
- Finally, reduce the mayo by about 1/4. For example, for 1 cup originally, use just 3/4 cup.
Also, check out our Deviled Eggs recipe for ideas on a Deviled Eggs Potato Salad.
Southern MUSTARD Potato Salad
To make Southern Mustard Potato Salad, follow these easy recipe changes.
- Replace 1/4 of the mayo with Yellow Mustard. For example, for 1 cup mayo originally, use just 3/4 cup mayo plus 1/4 cup yellow mustard.
Read about the “Health Benefits of Mustard” from HealthyFocus.org.
Southern LOADED Potato Salad
To make Southern Loaded Potato Salad, follow these simple recipe changes.
- Firstly, replace half of the mayo with sour cream. For example, replace the 1 cup mayo originally with 1/2 cup mayo plus 1/2 cup sour cream.
- Secondly, replace the red onion with about 6 green onions, chopped small.
- Thirdly, fold in about 1/2-pound of cooked, crumpled bacon PLUS 2 Tablespoons of the bacon drippings.
- Fourth, reduce the diced pickles by HALF.
- Finally, fold in about 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese.
Also, check out our loaded baked potatoes for any other related ideas.
Popular Questions for How To Make Southern Potato Salad
How Long To Boil Potatoes For Potato Salad?
Boiling potatoes for potato salad only takes about 10-15 minutes to cook. That’s because they’re cutup into bite-sized pieces first.
Do You Have To Wait For Potatoes To Cool Before Making Potato Salad?
Before making potato salad, hot potatoes definitely have to be cooled down a bit. But, they can still be warm. The speedy, easy way is to drain the hot cooked potatoes in a colander and then run cold tap water over them for a few short minutes. Another tip is to gently fold in some ice cubes. Regardless, you MUST let cooked potatoes to fully drain. This keeps the potato salad from being watery or runny.
How To Make Southern Potato Salad With Mashed Potatoes
Yes, you can make Southern potato salad with mashed potatoes. And that has 2 meanings. Firstly, it can refer to using already mashed potatoes. Secondly, it can mean to just partially mash some diced, cooked potatoes. The answer to both remains as YES!
Also, see our own darn good mashed potato salad recipe.
Can You Freeze Potato Salad?
Absolutely don’t freeze potato salad! While vinegar-based potato salads will fair better, mayonnaise-based or egg-based potato salads don’t do well after freezing. Regardless, ALL potato salads taste like crap after thawed out. Mainly, in all types of potato salads, the potatoes get way too mushy. Also, they often turn to a gray color. Yuk! I hear that even commercial food industries don’t freeze it when stored.
Recipes That Go With Southern Potato Salad
While your homemade potato salad is getting colder in the fridge, consider making these good paired recipes to go with it.
- Hamburgers, Brats, or Hot Dogs from the Grill
- Burger Sliders
- Fried Chicken Strips
- Charcoal Grilled Chicken
- BBQ Chicken from the Grill
- Sloppy Joe sandwiches
Nutritional Values of Potato Salad
This recipe for Southern potato salad calories are about 272 calories per serving. More detailed nutritional values are in the <Print Recipe> option.
Related Posts
- MASHED Potato Salad
- Pan Fried Potato Slices
- Frozen French Fries in the Air Fryer
- Baked Potatoes in the Oven
- Loaded Baked Potatoes
- Skillet Potatoes with Green Beans
- Southern Potato Salad (another version & very easy to make from SpicySouthernKitchen.com by Christin)
Conclusion of How To Make Southern Potato Salad Recipe
You’ve learned it’s easy to make this leading recipe for Southern potato salad. Firstly, you saw the main ingredient is Russet potatoes and their are options to this. Secondly, you saw all the remaining ingredients were common. Thirdly, you saw the potatoes cooking time was only about 15 minutes! Finally, you discovered there are many variations shown for tons of flexibility. So, hop to it and make this for going into the fridge for dinner tonight or the weekend!
Recipe for Southern Potato Salad
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Ingredients
- 4 large eggs hard boiled in instructions
- 1 tsp salt for cooking potatoes
- 8 medium potatoes Russet is preferred or New potatoes
- 1 stalk celery finely diced; large stalk
- 1 small red onion finely diced; white onion can be substituted
- 6 small Gherkins pickles finely diced; dill pickles can be substituted or both
- 1 tsp seasoned salt recommend Lawry's brand; or regular salt
- ¼ tsp Ground Black Pepper
- 1 cup mayonnaise adjust to your liking
- 1 tsp paprika optional garnish
Instructions
- Make hard-boiled eggs: Fill small sauce pan with eggs, fully covered in cold water. Bring to a boil, remove from heat, and cover with lid. Set aside for 10 minutes.4 large eggs
- Prepare and boil the potatoes: Using a vegetable peeler, peel potatoes. Dice them into bite-sized pieces and perform a final rinse. Fill medium-sized pot with diced potatoes and overfill with water by 2 extra inches. Add salt. Bring to a boil (uncovered) 10-15 minutes until done (see notes below); then, remove from heat.1 tsp salt, 8 medium potatoes
- Drain the boiled potatoes: Dump the potatoes into a colander to drain. Be careful of the steam from the water. Cool down the potatoes to stop them from cooking by running cold water over them. Leave them in the colander to drain further until needed.
- Peel the hard boiled eggs. Dice the eggs, celery, onion, and pickles and place into a large mixing bowl. Stir in mayonnaise, salt, and pepper to your taste until evenly distributed.4 large eggs, 1 stalk celery, 1 small red onion, 6 small Gherkins pickles, 1 tsp seasoned salt, ¼ tsp Ground Black Pepper, 1 cup mayonnaise
- Stir in drained boiled potatoes until evenly distributed. Transfer contents to a serving dish and top with paprika or your choice of garnish.1 tsp paprika
This is the first time I visited your web page. I absolutely loved this recipe. Fantastic job!
It’s like you read my mind. You appear to know so much about this like you wrote the book in it or something. Fantastic potato salad recipe!
Loved this southern potato salad. It was a perfect flavor that my family really liked for our picnic.
Great potato salad.
This was far easier to make than other potato salad recipes I’ve seen.