Let’s dive right in. When it comes to potato salad, you’ve got two main camps, vinegar or mayonnaise-based. For me, mayonnaise wins every time, just like we love it here in the South, below the Mason-Dixon line. Bolstering this opinion is a friend that adds, “Ich liebe diesen kartoffelsalat mehr als das deutsche rezept”. It means this is way better than the German stuff.
I’d love to say this is a treasured family recipe passed down for generations, but it’s not. In my family, no one ever wrote down recipes, and by the time I wanted to learn them, it was too late. There’s a life lesson in that—capture the things you love while you can.
This recipe is my own creation, shaped over time. I’ve included the ingredients I’ve grown to love and left out the ones I didn’t. After years of tweaking, I finally landed on my personal favorite version. Here’s my big reveal. I don’t like the whites of hard-boiled eggs. Mom always included them in her potato salad, and I’d spend more time picking around them than eating. My solution? Yolks only.
That said, I’ll concede a sliced egg adds a nice visual touch, so I garnish with one for those who do love hard-boiled eggs. After all, there’s always someone who’ll appreciate it. This is my amazing potato salad—simple, southern, and tailored just right.
Amazing Potato Salad
Potato salad with mayo, mustard, onion, celery, pickle and hard boiled egg yolk
Ingredients
- 3 lb red potatoes
- 1 cup Hellman’s mayo
- 3 TBL yellow mustard
- 1/2 white onion – finely chopped
- 2 hard boiled egg yolks – finely chopped
- 2 celery ribs – diced
- 1/4 tsp celery seed
- 1/2 tsp garlic salt
- 6 gherkin dill pickles – chopped
- Kosher salt to taste
- Fresh coarse ground black pepper to taste
- 1 hard boiled egg – sliced for garnish
- Paprika – sprinkle for garnish
Instructions
- Place potatoes in a large pot and cover with 2 inches of salted water. Bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer until fork tender all the way through, about 20 minutes. Drain well. Let cool, then peel, discard skins and cut into bite size pieces
- Hard boil the eggs: place them in a pot of cold water, bring to a boil, immediately remove from heat, rest for 10 minutes, remove and let them cool
- Mix your salad dressing. Mayo, mustard, garlic salt, pepper and celery seed first, then add the onions and celery and mix
- Peel your hard-boiled eggs, reserve 2 yolks, reserve the third whole egg until ready to garnish
- Adjust salt and pepper. It should be salty. When you mix it with the potatoes it will tone it down
- Pour the dressing over the potatoes and gently fold it in
- Add the dill pickle and egg yolks and gently fold them in
- Slice the hard boiled egg and use it for garnish. Sprinkle the paprika over everything
- Chill in the refrigerator for several hours