Or should I say, baked potato-style potato salad. Regardless, it is just as decadent as it sounds. And the thing is, it can be made even more so if you like. Add some blue cheese – or perhaps shredded cheddar. Hey, maybe once corn is in season, grill some up and shave an ear or two into the mix. How’s about a dollop of sour cream? Or creme fraiche? Sounds good to me.

Please be aware, though, I’m not responsible for starch (and bacon fat) overload anywhere but at my own house, okay?

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Baked Potato-Style Potato Salad

Yield: Serves 4-6

Ingredients

• 2 pounds medium-sized red bliss or new potatoes (red, white, blue, what-have-you), well-scrubbed
• 4 slices of good-quality bacon, such as Black Forest, cooked to your desired doneness and crumbled, bacon fat cooled slightly and reserved (yes. you read that correctly.)
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1 tablespoon coarse-grain (deli style) mustard
• 1 medium shallot, finely chopped
• 2 green onions (sometimes also called rareripes), coarsely chopped, white and light green parts only
• kosher salt
• freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over medium-high heat. Add the potatoes, and cook at a low boil for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the potatoes are easily pierced with a fork. If you're using smaller potatoes, boil for less time, employing the fork test around 15 minutes or so into the cooking time.
2. While the potatoes are boiling away, I like to get the bacon cooking done. Thought I'd share.
3. Pour the potatoes (and their cooking water) into a colander, then rinse with cold water. Allow the potatoes to drain completely of water, then transfer them to a large bowl.
4. Give each potato one good smash in the center with a fork to break the skin and flatten it slightly. Pour in the reserved bacon fat, then add the mayonnaise and mustard, and give it all a good stir. Your smashed potatoes are very likely now approaching mashed. This is all good.
5. Toss in the shallot, green onions, and bacon pieces, and give the potatoes another good spin of the mixing spoon. Add salt and pepper to taste, then serve it forth.

3.0

http://www.tinyfarmhouse.com/2011/06/baked-potato-potato-salad/

The four slices of bacon I used yielded just over 1 tablespoon of fat. If this idea disgusts you, feel free to use mayo or sour cream to make up the moisture difference.

Estimated cost for one batch of potato salad: $8.43. That’s $2.10 per person if four of you chow the whole batch, $1.40 per person if you share with two additional friends. The new potatoes at my favorite farm stand cost $1.49 per pound, so that’s $2.98. Black Forest bacon has gone up in price by around 30% over the course of a year, so it now costs $8.49 per pound. Four slices of bacon is nearly 1/2 pound, so we’ll call that $4.25 (gah!). Mayo costs around $3.49 for 64 tablespoons. We’re using 8 tablespoons, so that’s around 44-cents. Blissfully, the mustard I used has not gone up in price (prepare for deep-fried mustard recipes galore. Capitalizing on both the deep-fried and budget-conscious trends here. That’s what I’m doing.), so one tablespoon costs 8-cents. The shallot cost around 30-cents, and the rareripes/green onions were $1.50 for a bunch containing 8 rareripes, so that adds 38-cents or so to the total.