Red White and Blue Cheese Potato Salad
This Red White and Blue Cheese Potato Salad is a French style spin on a summer picnic favorite. Red potatoes, white potatoes, and delicious blue cheese are tossed with a delicious Dijon vinaigrette that your guests will love!
PSA: It’s Memorial Day. I’m not sure if you knew that or not, but just in case you didn’t, I thought I’d let you know. With all the commercials about Memorial Day sales and bottom dollar prices I think we all forget the reason there is a Memorial Day. It is a day to honor those who have lost their lives while serving their country. Not a day for amazing deals on cars or mattresses. Just saying.
On the other hand, it’s a time to get together with your loved ones and celebrate the summer season, life, and family. I like this side effect of Memorial Day better. For us, it was a concert on the lawn of the Capitol building, some fried chicken served cold, potato salad, some beans, maybe some marinated tomatoes; but always together and always having the best time.
Memorial Day is also the unofficial start of the summer season. Summer is picnics, grilling, and being out of the kitchen! It’s about traveling and camping and schlepping a cooler full of delicious food to be eaten in the great outdoors. It’s about unplugging! Talking, laughing, and spending time together. BEING with each other while enjoying simple and tasty meals.
To do this, you have to plan. And you have to prepare dishes that travel well and can be easily made ahead of time. Or at least the ingredients can be prepared ahead of time and the final dish can be assembled before serving. They should be simple with amazing flavor. I can’t stress the simple enough. Sometimes amazing flavor doesn’t mean 80 different ingredients. Sometimes, it’s a simple dressing, some vegetables, and a little bit of cheese. Just like this Red, White, and Blue Cheese Potato Salad.
I honestly played with the blue part in this recipe. Blue potatoes? Did I want to make my usual potato salad with red, white, and blue potatoes? What could I use for the blue? Cheese? Oh. Blue cheese! In a potato salad! GENIUS!
But I honestly didn’t want to make a typical, mayonnaise-based, potato salad. That just doesn’t sit well if you’re out at a summer party or picnic. In case you didn’t know, mayonnaise and hot weather just don’t go together. At all! Well, unless you want to get seriously ill, then have at it! But, I don’t. So, I won’t!
This leads to a different type of dressing for a potato salad; a vinaigrette dressing. What else has potatoes and a vinaigrette dressing? A salad niçoise does, that’s what! And there you have it! The perfect dressing for this potato salad! Salad niçoise has an amazingly tasty Dijon dressing with delicate tarragon and garlic flavors. And that’s it. Simple. Simple (there’s that word again) yet amazingly delicious.
The perfect simplicity of how this salad is prepared means you don’t even need to be in the kitchen very long at all. Put the pot with potatoes on to boil and step away. Come back about 10 maybe 15 minutes later and check them. Maybe they’re cooked. Maybe they need a few more minutes. Either way, you don’t have to watch potatoes boil.
And the dressing? I have this thing with re-purposing jars. So, I have a salsa bottle that I saved that’s PERFECT for homemade dressing. I pulled out that jar, poured all the ingredients in it, shook it all up, and threw it in the refrigerator. Well, I didn’t really THROW it in there, but you get the idea. It took longer to gather the ingredients than it did to make the dressing.
Once you boil the potatoes and make the dressing, you simply toss it all together before you serve it. This allows for more time to be spent OUT of the kitchen and with your friends and family. Unplugged, outside, and enjoying life. So, make some potato salad and get off the computer!
Oh, but not until you check out what the rest of the #SundaySupper crew have made to celebrate Memorial Day.
Red White and Blue Cheese Potato Salad
This Red White and Blue Cheese Potato Salad is a French style spin on a summer picnic favorite. Red potatoes, white potatoes, and delicious blue cheese are tossed with a delicious dijon vinaigrette that your guests will love!
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups chopped, red potaoes
- 1 1/2 cups chopped white potatoes
- 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
- 1/8 cup whole grain mustard
- 2 tablespoons nonfat Greek yogurt
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 2 teaspoons tarragon
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 cup crumbled blue cheese
Instructions
- Place the potatoes in a pot of cold water and bring to a boil. Cook until the potatoes are just barely fork tender. Drain and rinse with cold water. Refrigerate until cold, about 2 hours, or until you're ready to assemble the salad.
- Combine the next eight ingredients (vinegar through black pepper) in a small bowl (or repurposed salad dressing bottle). Stir well with a whisk and refrigerate over night.
- When you're ready to assemble the salad, place the potatoes in a large mixing bowl. Drizzle with half of the dressing and toss the potatoes with the dressing until combined.
- Fold in the blue cheese and add additional dressing, as needed. Keep refrigerated until you're ready to serve the salad.
Food Using One Color
Red Food
- Baby Back Ribs with Roasted Strawberry Barbecue Sauce by Crazy Foodie Stunts
Blue Food
- Blueberry Breakfast Cookies by Pies and Plots
- Blue Velvet Cupcakes by Hezzi-D’s Books and Cooks
Food Using Two Colors
Blue and White Food
- Blueberry Feta Cucumber Salad by Cindy’s Recipes and Writings
Red, White and Blue Food
- Easy Chocolate Covered Marshmallows by Palatable Pastime
- Grilled Shrimp, Tomato and Bleu Cheese Flatbread by Our Good Life
- Individual Loaded Red, White, and Blue Salads by The Weekend Gourmet
- Patriotic Panna Cotta by The Freshman Cook
- Red White And Blue Coleslaw by Nik Snacks
- Red, White, and Blue Parfaits by Life Tastes Good
- Red, White and Blue Cherry Pie by Savory Experiments
- Red, White, and Blue Potato Salad by A Kitchen Hoor’s Adventures
- Red, White and Blue Sangria by Food Lust People Love
- Red White and Blue Sundae by Desserts Required
- Tomato Blue Cheese Crostini by Magnolia Days
- Vanilla Pound Cake with Fresh Berries by Peanut Butter and Peppers
Great post. (And I used to have that kitchen towel – my brother has it now. Sorry, felt the “need” to share.) Love your twist to potato salad – and I think purple potatoes would be fun, too!
Never apologize for sharing! I love to hear from everyone. 🙂
Yum! A potato salad I’d actually like!
Thank you, Sarah. I LOVED it. Not sure the hubs did, though.
I love vinaigrette dressings on potato salads. And I do the same thing as you…I have quite the jar collection. My father in law always did too! Anyway…can’t wait to try your recipe…it will be perfect for our cookouts this summer!
Thank you, Michelle. Besides the nicoise style salads we have, I haven’t made strictly a potato salad with vinagirette dressing. I will be making more, that’s for sure.
When I saw this I knew I had to try it!
I hope you do. It’s tasty and different than typical potato salad.
Blue cheese and potatoes – yes please?!?!?
That’s what I said!
Such a yummy sounding potato salad!
Thank you!