Potato Salad Jacques Pepin

[Inell Krolick]

Scrubthe potatoes and put them, whole, in a saucepan with water to cover by 1/2 inch. Bring the water to a boil, reduce the heat, and cook the potatoes gently until they are just tender and can be pierced with a sharp knife. Drain immediately and let cool slightly. (Scrape the skin from the cooked potatoes, if you want, as soon as they can be handled. For a decorative look with fingerlings, scrape off only a band of skin, about 1/2 inch thick, all around the long sides of the potato.)

Heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil in a small saute pan. When hot, add the scallions and the onion, toss to coat well, and cook for about a minute over medium-high heat. Add the garlic, toss to mix, and cook for just a few moments, then remove the pan from the heat.

Slice the potatoes while still warm, cutting them crosswise into 1/2-inch sections. Put the pieces in a large mixing bowl, pour the wine and 3 or 4 tablespoons of olive oil over them, and toss gently to distribute. Add the warm vegetables from the pan, mustard, chives, chopped herbs, salt, and pepper, and gently fold all together, mixing well but not crushing the potatoes. Taste the salad and add more seasonings as you like.

Serve the potatoes warm (no colder than room temperature). Arrange the large radicchio leaves, if you have them, in a close circle on the serving platter, with their curved insides up, to form a rough bowl. Spoon the potato salad inside the leaves, sprinkle chopped egg around the edges, and parsley over the top.

Give the potatoes a good scrub, and put them in a pot big enough to accommodate them in a single layer. Add enough cold water to cover the potatoes by a 1/2 inch, and bring to a boil over high heat. Once the water comes to a rolling boil, reduce the heat to medium/low and simmer until the potatoes are just tender. Check them by piercing a potato with the tip of a sharp knife, you should feel no resistance. Drain the potatoes, and let them cool for a few minutes. If you 'd like to peel the spuds, now is the time. Since I'm using purple potatoes in this salad, I want to reveal the beautiful colour of the flesh so I'm using a small paring knife to remove the skins If I was making this salad with Yukon Gold or red skinned potatoes, I would omit this step because it's a bit of a bother.

Into a small skillet, over medium/high heat, add 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Add the shallots to the hot oil and sautee, stirring constantly for a minute or two. Turn the heat down to medium and continue to sautee the shallots until they begin to brown. Stir in the garlic and green onions, and cook briefly, about a minute, just until fragrant.

Cut the small potatoes in half, and larger ones into 1/2-inch slices. Put the potatoes into a large bowl. In a small jar with a lid, add the lemon juice, the rest of the olive oil, mustard, and herbs and seasonings, and shake well to combine the ingredients. This is your dressing. Add the warm vegetables from the pan to the potatoes, and pour the dressing over everything. Toss, very gently to evenly distribute the ingredients, be careful not to break up the potatoes in the process.

If you look through my blog, you will find a few potato salad recipes that you might like to try. They are perfect not only for the summer but in the winter as well. Some of them are light, and some of them are hearty, but all of them are super delicious.

However, today, I will share with you a recipe from my stepmother, who lives in southwest Germany. She is originally from the Rhineland region and proudly wanted to share her grandmother's Rheinischer Kartoffelsalat recipe with me. If you think that this recipe is new, think again, please. My stepmom is 96 years old! :- )

Let's learn how to make this recipe that is close to my heart and so loved in the family. While my stepmom cannot cook anymore, she used to be a legend among her friends, who would specifically ask for her recipe at every gathering.

This salad is good for up to 4 days if you store it in an airtight container in the fridge. I would not freeze it, as mayo and eggs are famous for changing their texture when thawed. Who likes a gummy salad, anyway?

We have reached the unlucky week 13 on Top Chef. Perhaps that is the reason this episode was so tremendously tense and dramatic. Or possibly it was because the lovely Carrie Mashaney was eliminated last week. Or maybe it was the polar vortex tightening its frigid grip over most of the country.

(Yes I understand how television and timing work and am fully aware that the contestants and judges had no idea that a life ruining cold snap would plague most of the country when the episode aired, but really, it's all I can really think about as I write this recap sitting on a space heater, which seems super safe.)

In the kitchen, Jacques Ppin greets the chefs for their Quickfire Challenge. He's wearing an apron, which is odd for guest judges on the show. The judges and the challenges are usually like me and any fight between my friends: watch but don't get involved. For the challenge, the chefs must recreate Jacques's favorite dish, dover sole with artichokes and asparagus, which he will first prepare for them. The winner earns immunity, though everyone thought it was a bit late in the game for immunity to still be on the table.

Carlos is very excited that Jacques Ppin is the guest judge because he "follows him on Facebook." I don't understand that logic. Here are some people and things I follow on Facebook: people I went to high school with, a guy who dumped me via text, and Planned Parenthood. I wouldn't be excited to see any of them.

Ppin prepares his favorite dish with grace and ease. He skins the sole, chops the vegetables, and cooks it all perfectly before finishing it off with a butter rose. Nick and Shirley Chung both feel confident going into the Quickfire because they both have French technique backgrounds.

Carlos never went to cooking school, so he struggles with the challenge, as does Stephanie Cmar. Apparently, the proper way to remove the skin from dover sole is in one clean pull, kind of like ripping off a piece of plastic wrap using the metal teeth on the box. Stephanie cannot do this and spends most of her time in the challenge trying to remove the skin. Nina Compton is pretty confident in her skills until with five minutes left she realizes that she never turned on the burners for her fish.

Jacques and Padma Lakshmi go around the room and see that the chefs completed the dish to varying degrees. The bottom are Brian Huskey, Stephanie, and Carlos. Ppin's favorites are Nick and Shirley. In the end Nick wins the Quickfire and thus immunity from elimination.

To introduce the Elimination Challenge, Padma brings in Julian Serrano and Dominique Crenn, representing Spanish and French cooking, respectively. They will each coach a team of three chefs to make a five course meal of their styles. The chefs will use ingredients common to both cuisines: olives, almonds, mussels, chicken, and chocolate. Add in whiskey and Baked Lays and that's basically my entire diet.

The chefs draw knives to find their teams. On the French team is Nick, Shirley, and Stephanie. On the Spanish team is Nina, Brian, and Carlos. Obviously the French team seems stacked with three stand outs and Nick and Shirley being trained in French cooking.

I'm having a hard time picking an early favorite here when it comes down to France or Spain. The cuisine of France features some of my favorite things like rich cheeses, pate, and bread. Spain, however, has chorizo and other cured meats. France has obnoxious pretentiousness, which I love and am great at, yet Spain has a whole culture centered around midday naps. And both countries drink a lot of wine. I can't decide, I'll leave it up to the chefs to make the decision for me.

After planning menus the teams go to Whole Foods. While team France is buying up all the cornish game hens and chicken liver they can find, Julian is wandering around the store looking for Nina and the rest of team Spain like a child who wandered off from his mother because he saw the candy aisle.

Since Nick has immunity, he takes on a lot of the French team's responsibility. He decides to make two courses, a chicken and chocolate dish with a corn silk nest as well as the dessert. Mastering the culinary concepts for both modern and traditional French cooking is difficult for all of the chefs, so they toast the end of day one with Dominique with white wine. Everyone is drinking out of a wine glass, except for Shirley, who is drinking out of a resealable plastic tub. It's like, Shirley, where do you think you are? My apartment on a Monday?

Before going to the kitchen for day two, Stephanie says, "I'm nervous this morning, but I'm nervous every morning," which I could not identify with more. Though I don't wake up nervous about being sent home, I'm nervous about having to leave home. Carlos misses his family and calls them on a flip phone. Carlos, this isn't Breaking Bad. Go to the Apple Store. Nick is confident but says that he knows everyone is leaning on him. He has quickly gone in my mind from "hot Jason's bro" to "good chef I think" to "kind of unpleasant guy who I feel is getting a little screwed over by other contestants" to "cocky jerk."

The first course is Shirley's snapper ceviche with dehydrated olives and olive oil ice cream against Nina's potato salad with green olives and gulf shrimp. The judges enjoy both, though are very impressed with how traditional and flavorful Nina's salad is.

The second course is Stephanie's pickled and poached mussels in crustacean jus and tomato. Having such success with mussels in the home cooking challenge a few episodes ago, it makes sense she took on the mussel dish. She didn't disappoint, and the judges, especially Tom, really enjoyed the flavor of her mussels. For the Spanish team, Carlos presents Nina's ajo blanco with almonds, crab, and cherries which gets a great response from the table.

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