4 Mistakes That Could Be Ruining Your Potato Salad

Eggs or no eggs? Mayonnaise-based or mustard-based? Russet or little red potatoes? Leaving the skin on or peeling the potatoes? The list goes on and on with how to make potato salad, right or wrong. Per usual, we Southerners have very strong opinions when it comes to this classic side dish. 

While there are plenty of things we can debate about potato salad and how to make it, there are a few things that are just plain no-no’s when it comes to the dish. Just as a Southerner would never use pre-shredded cheddar for pimento cheese (gasp!) or cook in an unseasoned cast iron skillet, there are a few potato mistakes one should know to avoid. These are the four big mistakes, plus a few suggestions to avoid, that could be ruining your potato salad.

Starting In Hot Water

Contrary to most recipes that require you to bring the water to a boil before adding your ingredient, when it comes to potato salad, you should be starting with cold water. Though some might disagree, ask anyone in the Southern Living Test Kitchens and they’ll swear by this. If you add them to already boiling water, the outside of the potatoes will cook too quickly and turn mushy before the inner part is fully tender. For evenly cooked potatoes, toss them into a large pot, cover with cold water, and then add salt before bringing them to a boil.

Forgetting To Salt The Water

One of the biggest non-negotiables is salting the water. Just as you would with pasta, seasoning the water is the only way to flavor the potatoes themselves. The vegetable absorbs the water it's cooked in, so if you just boil them in unseasoned water, you’ll end up with tasteless taters that no amount of mayo, herbs, or bacon bits can help. Adding salt to the water seasons them from the inside out so you’ll be able to start with the perfect potatoes for your dish.

Not Getting The Cook Time Right

Considering potatoes are the main ingredient, over- or undercooking them can lead to a less-than-perfect side dish. If you overcook them, the result is a mushy, grainy mess. And if you undercook them, you end up with crunchy (not in a good way) potatoes. It’s a delicate balance to achieve soft, tender potatoes for that just-right potato salad texture. Defer to your recipe for specific cook times, which depend on the type of potato being used, but a good rule of thumb is to boil them until you can pierce the spuds with a fork.

Rushing To Dress The Potatoes

Once the spuds come out of the water, it’s hard not to rush to add all the ingredients that turn the starchy vegetable into potato salad, but a little patience will do you good here. Each recipe differs depending on the type of potato salad—mayonnaise-, mustard-, or vinaigrette-based, but most of the time you’ll want to let the potatoes cool a touch. If you add the dressing too soon, especially with mayo-based recipes, they’ll soak it all up, leaving you with a dry potato salad, or the coating will become oily, which changes the texture of the dish.

Other Potential Potato Salad Ruiners 

These are the things that are up for debate on whether they’re mistakes or not, so while some might disagree with the following statements, we’d chalk these up to being mistakes as well…or cautionary tales, at the very least.

1. Cooking the potatoes whole. If you’re working with small Yukon gold potatoes, you could get away with cooking the potatoes whole before slicing them in half, but for most other types of potatoes, you’re better off dicing them before cooking.
2. Not peeling your potatoes before cooking them. And yes, some people actually wait until after cooking their potatoes to peel them! To us, this just seems like an unnecessary mess. There are many recipes that don’t even call for peeling off skin at all, like our red potato salad.
3. Not cutting the potatoes the same size. If your recipe calls for halved, cubed, or diced potatoes, be sure to try to cut them all to relatively the same size. When you have tiny pieces and large chunks, you may end up with unevenly cooked potatoes.