Just as the weather is starting to warm up, and I'm looking for something a little lighter on the palate, and on the hips, the Daring Kitchen challenges us to a healthy potato salad - perfect timing! Jami Sorrento was our June Daring Cooks hostess and she chose to challenge us to celebrate the humble spud by making a delicious and healthy potato salad. The Daring Cooks Potato Salad Challenge was sponsored by the nice people at the United States Potato Board, who awarded prizes to the top 3 most creative and healthy potato salads. A medium-size (5.3 ounce) potato has 110 calories, no fat, no cholesterol, no sodium and includes nearly half your daily value of vitamin C and has more potassium than a banana!
Despite the prize for originality, I went with one of the Daring Kitchen-provided recipes - Greek yogurt and dill potato salad. Even when the Daring Kitchen encourages us to go off and create our own dishes within the guidelines of the challenge, I still tend to follow one of the recipes they offer, for a couple of reasons. One, I'm really just not that creative. I love to cook, and I'm getting better at it, but coming up with new twists on old classics, or unique combinations of flavors is not quite my forte. Another reason I like to stay within the provided recipes is that it forces me to use ingredients and techniques that I otherwise wouldn't. If I chose my own recipes, I'd stick to foods and methods that I'm familiar with, no matter how hard I would try to break out of my comfort zone.
This potato salad was one of the best I'd ever had and, despite my undying devotion to mayonnaise, I think I may be making this one all summer. The peppers gave it a sweetness that was balanced out by just the right amount of sourness from the yogurt and lemon juice. I love, love, love dill, so there was just no going overboard on that. I think I may cut the potatoes a bit smaller next time, though, just because it gives more surface area for the dressing to coat. Really, though, that was my only complaint. I made it yesterday, and as I was packing it for my lunch today I snuck a tiny bite, and I can assure you, this one definitely gets better as it sits.
P.S. - please forgive the gratuitous pictures. It was an overcast day, which was the perfect lighting for playing around with my camera so I kind of went a little nuts.
