kitchen diary: june 28

i’ve had a craving for potato salad for a few months now, but i’ve been waiting for a summer weekend to make it. these days, i’m thinking about picnics and the upcoming holiday weekend. on this sunny day, i give in and make my favorite … salt and vinegar potato salad.

i love this salad, and most everyone who tries it immediately asks for the recipe. i have a thing for salt and vinegar potato chips, so i knew it’d be good when i saw the recipe in gourmet a few years ago. it requires few ingredients, but the flavors here are killer. old bay, pickled onions, salt and vinegar, tossed with creamy potatoes. it’s perfect when eaten warm, and also delicious cold, for lunch later in the week.
[a few cooking notes: i think it’s better to thinly slice the onion, or it can overwhelm the salad; also, i let the onions pickle in the vinegar for 90 minutes; finally, do not add all of the olive oil that the recipe calls for – it’s way too much – add to taste, or until the potatoes are glossy].
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for dessert, i make another dish i’ve been dreaming about since last summer: sour cherry cobbler. sour cherry season is short, but i fell for them while living in michigan (i think michigan cherries are better, but the ones i find at the market in brooklyn are still mighty good). pitting the cherries can be tedious; on sunday evening, however, it occupies an hour of quiet while sitting on the roofdeck and i find it quite satisfying (then again, i also really enjoy shucking corn). i bake up the cherries with a simple biscuit topping, and the dessert is every bit as good as i remember.