Potato Salad (Zemiakový Šalát)
Ingredients: 4 potatoes, about half an onion, 15oz can of sweet peas, 3 carrots, 2 dill pickles, 2 eggs, 6 tablespoons of mayonnaise, salt, black pepper, paprika
Prep Time: 1 hour, plus few hours to sit in the fridge
Yesterday my mom stopped here in Washington, D.C. on her way to San Francisco. I figured this was a golden opportunity to learn how she makes her really good potato salad. Here is the recipe for the Slovak potato salad, ala my mom.
Start by boiling unpeeled potatoes and 3 carrots, peeled, in salted water. At some point also hard boil 2 eggs.
Chop up about 3/8 of an onion into small cubes. For the non-math people, that’s a quarter plus half of another quarter. The carrots are done once they get soft (check them by occasionally poking them with a fork). Slice the carrots into thin quarter circle wedges.
Also chop up the pickles.
Combine vegetables in a pot.
Take out the potatoes when they are almost cooked through (soft outside with a slightly hard core in the middle). Peel them, dice them, and add to the pot.
Now stir in mayo. We started off with 3 spoonfuls, but ended up putting in 6.
Finally, cut up the eggs and mix into the salad. Add salt and black pepper to taste. Let sit in the fridge for few hours before serving. To see the final creation, check out the recipe for fried fish. Also, another popular Slovak salad is called treska. It is a fish salad made with onion and mustard.
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This is absolutely awesome. In Russia we have the same salad, called “Zimnii” or “Olivie” and it has absolutely same ingradients, just in addition of some meat. I just found the reference on it in wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_salad
Made this last week from this recipe. Was a HUGE hit with my Slovak friends.
Great to hear! I am about to have some myself here at my dad’s house in Slovakia. And of course, the fried carp and kapustnica.
It’s also called ‘Russian salad’ in English or ‘Ensaladilla Rusa’ in Spanish – here they often mix it with tuna and use it as ‘tapas’.
gotta correct you there , i live in spain and Ensaladilla Rusa is nothing like Slovakian potatoe salad, the Spanish version is swimming in mayonnaise, does not have pickels, nor onion, nor black pepper, so the final taste is very different.
Potato salad:
6 medium potatoes
4 hard boiled eggs
1/4 lb ham
1 small can or frozen bag of peas and carrots
1 small apple
2 pickles
1 tbs chopped pimento
1 small onion
2 strips of bacon
Mayo
Boil and cool potatoes, dice them, dice eggs choppe onion, pickle, dice apple. Fry bacon and use only little bits not grease. If you use fozen peas and carrots cook them. Combine wit Mayo. We called this salad Christmas salad.
Hi Lubos.
If you will add to your original recipe couple of small fresh kirbies finely chopped and 1 bunch of scallions also finely chopped,you’ll get a burst of freshness and taste. Enjoy.
geez Aigul, now I am really interested, what the heck are kirbies? As I have no idea, nothing I ran across in Slovak or any other cuisine, unless it’s some new name for something. I am getting really old to change
I second that. The only kirbies I know are the Nintendo ones, and they are too cute to chop up!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirby_(character)
HMMMM…#
That’s the best salad I’ve ever ate….Butyou forgot one the most important thing….
The Mayo must be Home-Made One.
All you need is :
- 6-8 eggs – yells to be separated of whites
- 3/4 – 1l of veg. oil
- 1 spoon of mustard
this mayo is The Havens in your mounth…
I second that, MUSTard is a “must”:)
One thing that you could look into adding – mustard! Before you mix in the mayo, in a separate bowl, mix in about 2 tbsp of mustard (Slovak if you can get it, the standard north American yellow will work too, but maybe a bit less of that one). It gives the salad a bit of a tangy taste (but not overpowering in the least).
Also – an easy cheat – buy a pack of frozen peas and diced carrots and boil those instead. Way easier and much quicker. Less work is always a bonus.
“For the non-math people, that’s [3/8 of an onion] a quarter plus a quarter of another quarter.”
Lubos, it looks like the math challenge is on the other foot. Three-eights would be a quarter plus HALF of another quarter.
Right. I didn’t have my TI-89 calculator handy.
Helen, remember, I am an engineer which means I can do only the USELESS math.
Kirbies are small cucumbers used injars for pickeling. You will find them in the produce section they are displayed with regular cucumbers and they’re called Kirby.
I am so excited, ever since my Babichka passed away no one I know was ablet o remember what went in the salad- thankyou so much for helping me regain these great memories and to be able to share them with my kids who never got to know my Babi!
Glad to be of help, Tanya. You know, there are many people like you commenting on this site, how they are so happy to have found recipes they only vaguely remember from their childhood. Before starting Slovak Cooking I had no idea there were so many people out there searching for the traditional dishes of their Slovak and Czech grandparents.
thanks for all the information you dont relise how good the food is un til you cant get it any more grand parents and parents get old so you have to try your self thanks again
Zemiakový šalát pripravujem tak isto, len mi vo Vašom recepte chýba nálev. Na štyri zemiaky jedna majolka stačí, pri vačšom množstve zemiakov by bol šalát hustý a suchý. Základné suroviny zostávajú. Cibuľu ale varím v náleve. Nálev: asi 0,5 litra vody, soľ, cukor, ocot a nakrájaná cibuľa. Zemiaky znesú dosť soli, množstvo soli zvoľte podľa toho, ako keby ste varili ošúpané zemiaky. V tom je to kuchárske umenie, keď gazdiná odhadne správne pomery surovín. My majonézový šalát milujeme, na Vianoce zemiaky varím v 5 litrovom hrnci. Pozor na žlčník.
very good recipe I am preparing it the same way and sometimes you can add black olives as well but not too many.thank you fro sharing this recipe.