Recipe Advent Calendar - Day 9 - Potato Salad and life lessons. :)

To finish up Salads, I guess I should probably add Potato Salad, the way the Blands make it.  LOL  The Stull family peels their potatoes and cuts them into cubes first, but I think it's a little mushy that way.  I like my potatoes to have a shape in potato salad, but not be too hard.  Bob likes them the mushy way and I like them not mushy - it's a fine line and means that we each need to compromise sometimes.  I switch back and forth on how I've made it, to accommodate each of us.  I've even gone so far as to cook half of the potatoes whole with skins on, like I like it, and half of them peeled and cut up, like Bob likes it.  LOL  The things you do to make a happy marriage!

It's sort of like when we got married, I liked Crunchy Skippy peanut butter and Bob liked Smooth Jif. We bought small jars of each.  I realized I liked Smooth Jif and Bob decided he liked Crunchy Jif instead.  So now we buy two kinds of Jif.  Ha!  Hey, if you can keep a marriage happy by buying two kinds of peanut butter, that seems like a win to me.

So, here's the Potato Salad recipe basically as I wrote it in our family cookbook.  But remember, potato salad is a personal choice and make it however you like it.  Some of the amounts change with the day, some change with how I'm feeling that day, or whose birthday it is, or whatever.  Experiment and make your potato salad how you like it!  And PLEASE, if you're taking it to a picnic, serve it chilled, on ice, or keep it in the cooler.  My pet peeve is salad with mayonnaise, sitting out in the sun waiting to poison everyone!!  

Potato Salad - the way the Blands make it.

4 baking potatoes, cooked whole in boiling water, until fork tender (if you score the skin around the middle of the potato with a knife before boiling, the skins just about slip off after they are boiled)
4 eggs, hard boiled (low boil for 12 minutes)
1/2 to 1 cup mayonnaise
2 tsp mustard
8 sweet gherkin pickles
a little pickle juice
2 tsp salt
pepper

After potatoes are boiled, take out of the water and allow to cool a bit until you can handle them.  Slip off the skins and cut potatoes into approx 1/2 inch cubes.  Place potato in a large bowl.  Peel eggs and cut up.  I like them in slices, Bob likes them cubed.  Experiment and decide what your own favorite is.  Add mayonnaise until creamy.  This will vary depending upon the type of potatoes, how you cooked them, the weather... who knows.  I use two really large heaping spoonfuls and adjust from there.  Add a heaping teaspoon - or two big squirts - of mustard.  (I'm really technical about my recipes, as you can see.)  Cut up several small sweet pickles.  I cut them in half, then in slices, but do what makes you happy.  Six or eight ought to do it.  Pour in a little of the pickle juice - a teaspoon or two maybe?  Add salt until it tastes right.  I always have to add more, so I'm guessing 2 tsp.  Add pepper if you like it.  I do.  Chill in the refrigerator.

There you go, potato salad and life lessons.  Be happy and compromise when needed.  :)

Recipe Advent Calendar - Day 8 - Orange Almond Salad

OK, on to Salads...

When I lived in California, there was a restaurant near us called The Magic Pan.  It was a creperie and I really loved going there for Orange Almond Salad and Coquilles St. Jacques crepes, which have shrimp and scallops in a béchamel sauce.  It was my favorite thing on the menu.  When we moved away, I taught myself how to make both of those items.  I learned how to make crepes and the béchamel sauce in an International Cooking class in college, but the Orange Almond Salad wasn't quite right because I couldn't get the dressing right.  Then I found a cookbook called The Make-A-Mix Cookbook that had a salad dressing mix that was perfect!!  That's where the dressing here came from.

Orange Almond Salad 

1 head romaine lettuce, torn into bite-sized pieces
1 can mandarine oranges, drained
1 pkg. sliced almonds
Sweet Salad Dressing, below

Turn on broiler in the oven.  Put sliced almonds on a cookie sheet. Set cookie sheet a couple of inches below heat in the oven and toast almonds.  Watch carefully because it won't take long.  Shake the pan a couple of times to keep them from burning and sticking.

Put romaine lettuce in a bowl, top with mandarin oranges and almonds, serve with dressing.

Sweet Salad Dressing
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp. instant minced onion
1 tsp salt
1 tsp dry mustard
1 tsp paprika
(their recipe calls for 1 tsp celery seed, but I don't like it.)

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl, mixing until well blended.  Put mixture in foil packet or 1 pint glass jar.  Label.  Store in a cool, dry place.  Use within 6 months.  Makes about 1/2 cup of mix.  (I generally make three or four packets at a time to save time.

To make the dressing, use
1 recipe of the Sweet Salad Dressing
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup vinegar

Combine in a glass jar and shake.  Chill before serving.  Makes about 1 1/4 cups dressing.