The Salad Bar: Loaded Baked Potato Salad

It's the second month of my newest blog challenge, The Salad Bar.  

This month's theme lent itself to many different possibilities.  This month we were supposed to make any kind of picnic or potluck salad.  Pasta salad, potato salad, cole slaw, etc.  Anything you would make for a summertime get-together.  I perused my Pinterest boards for something that fit this category and found one that I had been wanting to try.  It's a potato salad with all the yummy flavors of a loaded baked potato: sour cream, bacon, cheddar cheese, green onions, and I even threw in a little ranch dressing for good measure!  It's adapted from Dishing with Leslie.

Loaded Baked Potato Salad

Ingredients:

¼ cup mayonnaise

¼ cup sour cream

¼ cup ranch dressing

2½ lbs. potatoes

½ cup shredded cheddar cheese, plus a little more for topping

¼ cup fresh chives or green onions, chopped, divided

8 strips of bacon, cooked and crumbled

Directions:

In a small bowl, mix together the mayonnaise, sour cream, and ranch dressing. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Meanwhile, peel and cube your potatoes in to ¾” pieces. Put potato cubes in a large pot of cold water.  If using Russet potatoes, swirl potato cubes around in the pot until the water gets cloudy.  Drain off the water and fill pot with fresh cold water.  Repeat this process, swirling the potatoes in the pot and draining off the starchy water until the water runs clear.  Cover the potatoes with cold water a final time, add some salt, cover, and bring to a boil. When the water comes to a boil, remove lid and continue boiling until potatoes are just barely fork tender.  Start checking them after just a few minutes, because if they over cook, you will end up with loaded mashed potatoes instead of potato salad.  When they are just barely fork tender, remove the pot from the heat, drain the potatoes, and rinse with cold water. 

Put potatoes in a large bowl  and dump in the ½ cup of cheese, most of the crumbled bacon (reserving a little for topping), and most of the chopped chives or green onions (again reserving some for topping).  Pour in the mayo/sour cream/ranch dressing mixture and toss gently to combine everything.  Top with reserved cheddar cheese, bacon, and green onions.  

Makes 4-6 servings.

This potato salad is so yummy!  The little bit of ranch really makes it, I think.  It's creamy and flavorful.  You can use any kind of potato you like.  If you are using a waxier potato, like Yukon Golds or a small red potato, you can skip the step where you rinse the starch off.  But that helps tremendously if you are using Russet potatoes.  They are much less likely to get mushy around the edges with the starch removed.  I use that little trick when making mashed potatoes too.  Makes them not so gluey.

I peeled my potatoes, but you could certainly leave the skin on if you prefer.  That would actually be kind of neat with the whole baked potato theme.  I would definitely leave the skin on if using yellow or red potatoes.

This potato salad is a nice little change from the traditional mustard potato salad.  It would definitely be a hit at your next summer party.

Check out all of the other great summertime salads below and come back next month to see what kind of salad I make with avocado!