This week’s recipe for Pesto Potato Salad had NO MAYO. It was my kind of salad except that it’s just not very photogenic. Or…was it just me?
Picked by Liz of TheNotSoSkinnyKitchen. The recipe can be found on Liz’s blog or here at foodnetwork. It is an Ellie Krieger “The Food You Crave” recipe and Ellie claims “a definite crowd pleaser”.
I immediately ignored the recipe directions and boiled my potatoes instead of steaming them.
The skin falling off the potato was the result. In the book, the directions clearly indicate “….steam until cooked through but the skins remain intact….”. Step one of the instructions, fouled up.
Other than 1 1/2 lbs of small red potatoes, there isn’t much to this recipe. Simply add 1 yellow and 1 red bell pepper, both chopped (add chopped celery or other additions you might like). Then add the peppers to a bowl with the potatoes (quarter the potatoes first) and add 1/3 cup Basil Pesto. I bought my pesto at the store but Ellie offers a recipe for homemade Basil Pesto. Gently combine all ingredients and add salt and pepper to taste.
You won’t see red peppers in the salad. I used ORANGE and YELLOW and I added chopped celery for a little extra crunch.
I sprinkled paprika on top since I didn’t have any fresh basil to garnish.
You can easily see all salad components above: yellow pepper, potato with pesto, celery, and orange pepper.
I enjoyed this salad more the next day when I heated it. Guess I’m not big on cold potatoes. Ted, who really likes potato salad thought it was very good. Teddy, also liked it and said, “It was great – that’s as descriptive as I can get for the blog”. Well….he tried.
Good pick Liz! You knew what you were doing when choosing this recipe. Way to go!
Joanne
Looks great. I ended up with orange and yellow peppers as well…must have been a run on the red ones when I was at the market as there were none. Oh, well, it tasted great. I liked it better warm as well as I tried it cold this morning and thought, “Definitely like it warm better.” You did a great job with the photos…it was hard to get a good picture as it tasted so good, but photos weren’t all that impressive in my camera.
I like the idea of the paprika. Extra color always good. I liked it better warm or oven temp than cold. It was tasty.
Ooo I love pesto as an alternative to mayo!
Looks very colorful and kinda curry’ish! I need to print some of these out so i can start making them!!
I probably would have done exactly what you did and boil the potatoes had I made this. Now I know I will need to steam them when I make at a later date. I had too much company in this week. I’m behind on everything. Company coming tomorrow night for dinner as well. Yours looks really good. I don’t care for pesto, but homemade might taste better than the bought kind so I’m game to try it.
Yum! thanks for sharing!
I agree about the pictures – even the one on Food Network’s site doesn’t look great. I guess when everything is coated in pesto, it’s hard to photograph. But it sure did taste good! Thanks for cooking with me this week, and I’m glad you guys enjoyed it!
Joanne,
I like my potato salads warm too! I loved all the spices you added to your salad. I’m big on spices, and I love seeing other foodies embracing them too!
I love anything with potatoes oh wow these look great!
I adore potato salad and this is a great recipe, thanks for sharing!