French Potato Salad

Photo: Eric Diesel

As June progresses, we welcome every opportunity to congregate outdoors. The cookouts that we inaugurated on Memorial Day have become a fact of weekend life, and those weekends are inaugurated earlier. The barbeque tongs and grill baskets come out as early as Wednesday, as friends gather on city terraces or country back yards to twiddle drinking glasses filled with a bartender’s skill and scent fragrant smoke resulting from the grillmaster’s efforts. A spicy side of salmon or a luscious London Broil are welcome simple suppers, but while the food nourishes us body and soul it is the camaraderie that embraces us like the gathering twilight.

It is bad form to attend a communal meal empty-handed. Wine is always welcome, and we might bring an easy take-along dessert or side dish. Summer foods bring their own mystique to whatever table you’re complimenting. Traditional picnic foods such as take-along salads compliment such cookout classics as hot dogs and hamburgers, while a selection of artisanal spreads compliments a cheese board. Raise a nautical flag to steamed and grilled seafood by bringing a selection of home-canned pickles and relishes, or offer to bring the ice cream for dessert. A pacific beach party may feature such Asian influences as steamer baskets steeped in sake, while at a New England-themed one, if someone offers to build you a cabinet, don’t expect them to reach for a hammer – that’s just Rhode Islandese for making a milkshake.

If cookout cooking has an official dish, it’s potato salad. Potato-salad wars are nothing new to makers, eaters, appreciators and opinionators of this venerable dish. For the all-American classic, whether to include or disallow ingredients from yellow mustard to boiled eggs to pickles evokes Gettysburgian levels of patriotic discourse, sometimes right down to the fistfights. But though the chunky mayonnaissey tater salad(s) we know and love will always have a place on the sideboard, this dish has expressions beyond the red, white and blue.

The commonly encountered German potato salad, served hot, is briney with red vinegar and crunchy with crumbled bacon, but did you know about the German potato salad that is tart with sour cream and bright with diced onion? Eastern European potato salad is lively with sour pickles and flirtatious with feathery dill. Italian potato salad is a deconstruction of roasted potatoes, balsamic vinegar, peppers and oil. Then there are those versions -- products of the creativity that is inherent in cooking -- that incorporate everything from anchovies and garlic to tomatoes and chiles.

In our urban home, the favorite potato salad is French. In this classic preparation, thin-skinned red potatoes are boiled just until tender and then dressed with a vinaigrette incorporating a bisou of sweet shallots and an embrasse of salty capers. Pour les hardcore, French potato salad is served with thinly sliced radishes or blanched haricots verts, either of which would work to accompany the simple, foolproof recipe below. I often make this dish to accompany weeknight dinners from the sauté pan as well as the grill. And, mais oui, I bring it to cookouts, where it takes up residence on the board with the other sides and in the bellies of the other guests.

FRENCH POTATO SALAD

Baby red potatoes are widely available in grocery stores, but if you have the opportunity, treat yourself to a few varieties from the Farmer's Market.  Do not skip the step of soaking the potatoes in the vermouth; aside from adding flavor this helps the potatoes retain their shape once they are folded into the dressing. An in-sink colander is an inexpensive, indispensable tool for your urban kitchen; you can obtain a good one here.

2 pounds baby red potatoes, such as Red Cloud, Sangre or Bris du Nord
2 tablespoons dry vermouth
2-1/2 tablespoons white vinegar
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1 large or 2 medium shallots
2 tablespoons capers
One bunch fragrant soft herbs, such as tarragon, chervil or summer savory
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper

1. Rinse the fresh herbs under cool water and set aside to drain on a double layer of paper toweling.

2. Fill a pan large enough to hold the potatoes with water.  Add a generous sprinkling of salt.  Place the pan on the stovetop and turn the heat to medium-high.  Place a metal dinner fork safely within reach of the pan.

3. Put an in-sink colander in place.  Empty the potatoes into the colander and rinse the potatoes thoroughly.  Pick through the clean potatoes, using the tip of a paring knife to remove eyes or brown spots if any.

4. Working one at a time, slice each potato crosswise into quarters or thirds depending on the size of the potato, to form coins approximately 1/4' thick.  Once you have sliced the potatoes, gently place them into the pan containing the heating water.  It is okay if the water comes to the boil but it is not necessary for the water to boil hard.

5. Cook the potatoes just until done.  The time will vary based on the potatoes; start testing after five minutes.  The potatoes are done when the tines of the fork push into the flesh of one of the thickest slices without meeting resistance.

6. While the potatoes are cooking. measure the capers into the colander to drain.

7. Remove the root and stem ends of the shallot(s); remove the papery outer skin. Halve the shallot from root to stem; halve each half. Cut each quarter into crescents and then cut across the crescents to form dice. Scrape the diced shallot into a large mixing bowl.

8. Measure the vinegar into the mixing bowl containing the shallot.  Add a sprinkling of salt and several grindings of fresh black pepper.  Set the bowl aside while the shallots soften.

9. Once the potatoes are cooked just until done, empty the potatoes into the colander to drain.  It is okay that the capers are still in the colander.  Gently shake the colander to be sure all of the water drains from the potatoes, and to evenly distribute the potatoes and capers.

10. Measure out the vermouth and sprinkle the potato-caper mixture with the vermouth.  Allow to sit for ten minutes.

11. Measure the mustard into the bowl containing the softened shallots.  Use a wire whisk to combine the mixture while pouring the olive oil in a thin stream to form an emulsion.

12. Give the colander containing the seasoned potato-caper mixture a shake to drain excess liquid if any.  Gently tumble the potato-caper mixture into the dressing.  Use a silicon spatula to gently combine the potatoes with the dressing.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate a minimum of 1 hour.

13. Before serving, lay the drained fresh herbs on a clean cutting board reserved for produce.  Use a sharp knife to mince the herbs.  Sprinkle the potato salad with fresh minced herbs just before serving.