German Potato Salad

potato salad with chives and pancetta in a blue bowl on a picnic table with gingham plates and pink linen napkins

4.98 from 35 votes

German Potato Salad is made with tender potatoes, crispy pancetta, fresh herbs, and a warm Dijon vinaigrette. An easy side dish for grilling season.

Prep Time5

Cook Time25

Total Time30

Course: Side Dish

Cuisine: Mediterranean

Servings: people

Author: Gaby Dalkin

Equipment

Ingredients

3 pounds baby new potatoes halved or quartered
8 ounces pancetta small diced (or bacon)
1 large red onion diced
¼ cup champagne vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
⅓ cup olive oil
Salt and freshly ground pepper
8 green onions thinly sliced
1 bunch chives thinly sliced
¼ cup chopped fresh parsley leaves

Instructions

Place potatoes in a large pot of water and bring to a boil. Cook until fork tender and remove from heat, drain and set aside in a bowl.
While the potatoes are cooking, place the pancetta in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Fry until browned and crisp, turning as needed. Remove from the pan and set aside.
Add the diced onion to the pancetta grease, and cook over medium heat until browned.
Carefully add the vinegar and mustard to the onions and cook for 2 minutes and turn off the heat. Whisk in the oil and season, to taste, with salt and pepper. Add the hot dressing to the potatoes and toss gently to coat. Fold in the pancetta, green onions, chives, and parsley. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Notes

Dress the potatoes while they are still steaming hot. Warm potatoes are porous and actively absorb the vinaigrette as they cool, coating them from the inside out. Cold potatoes have already sealed up and will only ever be coated on the surface, which tastes flat by comparison.
Start the potatoes in cold salted water, then bring everything to a boil together. Dropping potatoes into already-boiling water shocks the exterior and turns the outside mushy before the center is cooked through. A cold start ensures an even, gradual cook all the way to the middle.
Cut the potatoes before boiling, not after. Halving or quartering the baby potatoes increases the cut surface area, which means more vinaigrette absorption and a faster, more even cook time. Whole potatoes take much longer and absorb far less dressing.
Salt the cooking water aggressively, as if you are cooking pasta. Potatoes are starchy and bland at their core. Seasoning the water is the only opportunity to season them from the inside. The dressing alone applied after the fact cannot compensate for under-seasoned potatoes.
Cook the pancetta low and slow until fully crisp before removing it from the pan. Properly rendered pancetta releases enough fat to build the dressing base and delivers a crispy texture that holds up once tossed with the warm potatoes. Underdone pancetta turns chewy and greasy when it hits the warm salad.
Build the dressing directly in the pancetta drippings while the pan is still warm. The residual pancetta fat emulsifies with the vinegar and mustard and carries all the smoky, savory flavor into every bite of the salad. Discarding the drippings throws away the most flavorful ingredient in the pan.
Caramelize the red onion fully in the pancetta fat before adding the vinegar. Raw onion has a sharp bite that dominates the dressing. Cooking it down in the fat mellows its sulfur compounds and develops a gentle sweetness that balances the acidity of the champagne vinegar.
Let the vinegar and mustard cook together for the full two minutes before pulling off the heat. Cooking the vinegar briefly drives off some of the harsh raw acidity and lets the mustard bloom into the liquid, which produces a rounder, more cohesive dressing rather than a sharp, one-note one.
Whisk the olive oil into the pan off the heat, not while it is still on the burner. Whisking oil into a very hot liquid can cause the emulsion to break and the oil to taste heavy and greasy. Pulling the pan off the heat first gives you a stable, glossy vinaigrette.
Use champagne vinegar and do not swap it for apple cider vinegar. Champagne vinegar has a lighter, more delicate acidity than apple cider vinegar, which can overwhelm the fresh herbs and dressing balance. White wine vinegar is the only acceptable substitute if champagne vinegar is unavailable.
Add the herbs only after you have poured the dressing over the potatoes. Tossing chives, parsley, and scallions directly into a hot pan wilts and dulls them immediately. Adding them to the dressed potatoes preserves their color, texture, and fresh flavor in the finished salad.
Serve the salad warm or at room temperature, not straight from the refrigerator. Cold temperatures cause the olive oil in the dressing to congeal and the potatoes to firm up, which mutes the flavor and changes the texture. If making ahead, pull it out at least 20 minutes before serving and give it a gentle toss.

Nutrition (estimated)