How To Make German Potato Salad

I always thought of this more as a cold-weather kind of dish. But someone suggested it to go along with kielbasi, and it sounded like a great idea. It's actually easier to make than "regular" potato salad, and is also pretty good cold.

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Ingredients

5 pounds red potatoes
2 pounds bacon (see note below)
1 small onion (or part of a large one, use your leftovers)
apple cider vinegar
dark brown sugar

Directions

Set a large pot of salted water on to boil. While that's coming to a boil, cut the potatoes into bit-sized pieces.



You can peel them first if you want. I don't mind having the skin there in the finished dish, but you should make sure you cut out any eyes that have started to sprout. The sprouts taste kind of gritty. (Don't ask how I know.)

Rinse them well in a colander before putting them in the boiling water, then boil until they're fork tender. Mine took about 15 minutes. It will depend on how small you dice them and what kind of potatoes you got. Drain them in the colander.



Be careful pouring them into the colander. Steam is hot. (This could be your face.)



While the potatoes are cooking, you can get started on the bacon. When I started dicing the bacon, I realized I had grabbed the two-pound pack from the freezer instead of a one-pound pack. "Oops, too much bacon," I thought to myself. Then I realized how silly that sounded, "Too much bacon." Can you even use those words in that order?

For some tips on getting better bacon, and how to cook it, take a look at the post on macaroni dinner salad. Cook it and transfer the finished bacon to the same bowl you're going to put the finished salad in. Pour off most of the fat (filter it and keep it for later) but leave a little in the pan.



Dice the onion and add it to the pan you cooked the bacon in. Sauté until translucent and starting to turn brown.



If you checked out that macaroni salad link above, you noticed I was using a non-stick pan, and this time I'm using stainless steel. Here's why. When the onion is cooked, deglaze the pan with the cider vinegar. Add enough to coat the entire bottom of the pan, and scrape up all the brown bacony goodness. If you need measurements -- and this is definitely not an exact science -- it's a little less than a half cup.



Remove the pan from heat and stir in two or three tablespoons of dark brown sugar.



Add the potatoes and half the bacon back to the pan and toss everything together. Be careful not to smash the potatoes too much.



Don't worry about getting it perfectly mixed. It's better to toss it quickly, so all the vinegar doesn't get absorbed into just one layer of the potatoes.

Transfer the bacon to a smaller serving bowl. As soon as most of the vinegar is absorbed, turn everything out into the bowl. Top with more of the bacon. Serve with the rest of the bacon on the side for people who want even more bacon. (And who doesn't like even more bacon?)



And that's it.

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This was one of the winning suggestions in the first What Should I Make Next? contest. Contratulations to Kristin, who will be getting her copy of my book later today.

If you'd like to get a free copy for yourself, send me a suggestion at requests@cooklikeyourgrandmother.com. If I make it I'll send you the eBook when I post the finished recipe. (Click here for request guidelines.)

Macaroni Dinner Salad

Light enough for a hot summer night, but more filling than plain salad. This is a cross between a garden salad and macaroni salad, pretty much the best of both worlds. If you're the kind of person who could make a meal of just macaroni salad -- and I know I can't be the only one -- this will make it more acceptable to your spouse.

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Ingredients

1 pound macaroni
1/2 head iceberg lettuce
-- or --
1-2 bunches Romaine lettuce
1 pound bacon
2 hard boiled eggs
1/2 large onion
1 green bell pepper
tomatoes (number depends on size)
chick peas / garbanzo beans (optional)
2 cups mayonnaise

Mayo

1-1/2 cups olive pomace oil
3 egg yolks
2 tablespoons white vinegar
2 teaspoons mustard powder

Directions

All the cooking here can be done in advance, and one thing at a time, so you don't get the kitchen all heated up in the late afternoon. Or you can do like me and have two or three pans going on the stove at the same time. I haven't decided if that represents good organizational skills or bad.

Start by cooking the macaroni. No, I didn't take pictures of that, they've got directions printed right on the box. Follow them. And don't try this with fresh pasta. You want something kind of sturdy, and fresh pasta is usually much more tender. When it's al dente, drain and rinse it in cold water. Toss with a couple of tablespoons of olive oil to keep it from sticking. (See note below after the bacon.)

While the macaroni is going, dice up all the bacon into bite-sized pieces before cooking. This is easier to do if the bacon is frozen, or nearly frozen. And it's a lot easier and cleaner than crumbling it up after it's cooked. Best of all, it's way easier to cook everything to the same level of done-ness.

Frugal tip: Buy the bacon ends whenever you see them at the butcher. They'll usually be more than a dollar a pound cheaper, and they typically have more meat and less fat than the rest anyway.

Go with non-stick or cast iron when you dice the bacon like this, or you'll break everything up into tiny little crumbs trying to turn it over. And use a splatter guard. If you like to brag, you can spend $50 on one. Wow. I think mine was four or five bucks at the Drug Mart.



Remove the finished bacon to a plate covered with a couple of paper towels, then filter and store the rendered fat. You'll want it next week when you do the green beans.



If your bacon and macaroni are done at about the same time, add a couple of tablespoons of the bacon fat to the macaroni and stir it in. This will keep the noodles from sticking to each other.

Now dice the green pepper and ... hold on.



I said up above that this called for a whole green pepper, why am I only using a half? Because using up leftovers is more important than following a recipe exactly. Unless you're baking, that is. With baking you follow recipes exactly.

So anyway ... dice the pepper and onion.



And chop the lettuce.



If you've got a really sharp eye, you'll see a head of iceberg with the ingredients, but that's Romaine in that picture. I was in the middle of making this when I realized I still had some Romaine left from the night before. Anyone who has ever worked at a restaurant will tell you that you always use the oldest food first.

Add the macaroni and mayonnaise to the lettuce and toss it together.



Then add the bacon, onion and green pepper and toss.



Dice the hard-boiled eggs for a topping and serve.



I like to add more egg to each serving after I've plated it, and add the tomatoes last.



Optionally add some chick peas / garbanzo beans.



And that's it.

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Make sure to check back tomorrow as I'll be showing the richest, most decadent pie in the world. Well, okay, it's not covered in gold leaf. Is dark, bittersweet chocolate close enough? It is for me.

Get it free in your inbox by signing up in the column to the right.

How To Make Twice Baked Potatoes

I wanted to do twice baked potatoes for a cookout, but I wasn't in the mood for cheese. So I thought I'd do the same preparation, but using the ingredients I'd normally put on a baked potato. I wasn't sure how successful it would be, but everyone said it was better than the normal cheesy kind.

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Ingredients

8 large Russet potatoes
1 cup bacon fat
1 cup sour cream
1 large onion
1/2 cup chives

Directions

Insert skewers in the potatoes and put them in a 400 degree oven. You can wrap them in foil, like I did in that link, or do them unwrapped, like I did here. While they bake, melt a couple of tablespoons of bacon fat in a pan. Shred the onion and cook until well browned.




Go through the chives to pull out any dead stems, then dice and set aside.



Dice the onions fairly small.



When the potatoes are done (about 45 minutes to an hour, the skewers come out without resistance) take them out and cut them in half.



Scoop out the inside of each half with a spoon. Leave just enough so that the skin retains it's shape. Take out a little more than you would if you were making potato skins.



Put the scooped-out potato in the same pan you did the onions in, and add the bacon fat, sour cream and onion. Mash everything together and check if you need salt and pepper.




If you recognize that tool I'm using, it's the same one I used for the chili a while back. I didn't want to like it, but I'm finding it makes a bunch of jobs easier. Thanks honey, you were right. (She didn't read it the first time I said that. I'll keep bringing it up until she says something about it.)

Once everything is mashed together, add the chives and mix gently. You don't want to crush the chives and turn the potatoes green.



Scoop the filling back into the skins. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and you can keep these for several days in the refrigerator before cooking them, or freeze them for several weeks. I can't say exactly how long. This is a brand new recipe and I haven't kept any of them around that long. When you want to serve them, reheat in the oven or microwave until hot. (See, I can use the microwave.) For a crispy top, finish under the broiler.



And that's it.

How To Make Taco Salad

Unless you're really good friends with them, you probably wouldn't serve franks and beans to dinner guests.[1] And unless you're hosting a party for kids, your wife may not let you make tuna puffs or BP&J. But some things, no matter how much you love it, you have to admit to yourself that it just doesn't look good enough to serve to anyone else.

I'd like to believe this salad doesn't fall into that last category, but looking at the pictures I've got to say I'd be a little suspicious of it if someone else offered it to me. I could probably "fix" that by assembling it like a "normal" salad: lettuce on the bottom, then toppings, then dressing on top. But this is how I've eaten it ever since my aunt first served it to me out of a zip-top bag at a picnic when I was eight years old. So I'm not changing it.

Ingredients

Taco meat

1 pound ground beef
1 can (12 ounces) plain tomato sauce
1/4 cup chili powder (or taco seasoning)
3 cloves garlic (optional)

Salad

1 head iceberg lettuce
1/2 pound sharp cheddar cheese
1/4 large onion (about 1/2 cup diced)
4 Roma tomatoes (about 1/2 cup diced)
1-1/2 cups thousand island dressing
5 ounces (about half a medium bag) corn chips

Directions

Brown the ground beef in a frying pan with some salt, breaking the beef up as much as possible. (The same was as in the chili dog chili sauce recipe.) Add the garlic and chili powder (or taco seasoning) and the tomato sauce.





Cook until everything is heated through, then remove from heat and allow to cool while you prepare the salad.

Dice the onion.



Cut the tomatoes into quarters and remove the seeds. Slice the meaty part lengthwise into thin strips.



Then finish dicing the tomatoes.



(Hmm, I think I need to do a post on dicing tomatoes ... )

Core and chop the lettuce.




If I really wanted to be strict with my mise en place, I'd shred the cheese into a bowl, but I had left it out too long by this time. When you shred warm cheese, it tends to start sticking right back together if you put it all in one big pile. So I shredded it right onto the lettuce.



I didn't use that entire block of cheese. That's about three-quarters of a pound, and I used a bit more than half of it.

Add the tomato and onion.



Toss everything together a little, then add the thousand island dressing.



Look at your bowl and realize that yes, you should have used the biggest bowl for this. (Damn, I hate when I do this.) The bowl can't just be big enough to hold everything, it has to be big enough to mix it around easily. When you're mixing, you generally want a bowl at least twice as big as you'd need just to hold all the ingredients.

Once you've got it in a big enough bowl, toss the salad until it is well coated with the dressing. Then add the corn chips.



(This is not product placement. You can't see what brand that is. These are not the corn chips you are looking for ... )

Add the taco meat and stir to combine.



You want to do the corn chips and taco meat last. Otherwise the chips will get soggy, and the warm meat will melt the cheese. If you're not going to be serving this right away, let the meat cool all the way before adding it, and don't include the chips. Bring the salad in a zip-top bag or a bowl with a tight lid, and add the chips when you're ready to serve.



And that's it.

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1 Why is that, anyway? Why do we try to impress strangers, we'll at least straigten up for friends, but if we're just serving family they're lucky if we're not still in pajamas? I can't remeber where I got this line, but we'll spend money we don't have buying stuff we don't need to impress people we don't like.

If you have any recipes that you love to eat, but won't serve to guests, tell me about it in the comments below. I want to do a whole roundup of "too good for guests" meals.

How To Make Thousand Island Dressing

Every now and then when I stop to think about it I wonder why ketchup is so much more popular than thousand island dressing. As far as I'm concerned thousand island is much more flavorful, and works on just about everything ketchup works on. Any fast food place that brags about their "secret sauce" is really talking about thousand island. (Oops, now it's not a secret any more.) One of my favorite uses -- and the one that gets the strangest looks -- is to use it instead of duck sauce with egg rolls. Mmmmmmm.

If you look carefully and shop around you may be able to find a brand that isn't mostly canola oil and corn syrup. But if you can't find a good one, this recipe is just what you need. It's way better than any bottled brand I've had, and only takes a couple of minutes to make a batch.

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Ingredients

2 cups mayonnaise

Mayonnaise

2 extra large eggs
1-1/2 cups olive pomace oil
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon mustard powder

2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup diced onion
1/4 cup diced pickle (sweet, dill, or combination)
1 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
1 extra large egg, hard boiled (optional)

Directions

Dice the onion.



Dice the pickle. If you have small ones, cut them in quarters ...



... and chop several at once.



For larger pickles, you may want to cut out the seeds before dicing the rest.

Set the onion and pickle aside. This is for your mise en place.




Mince the garlic.



If you're making the mayonnaise from scratch, put the eggs, white vinegar, mustard powder and oil in your mixing cup in that order. Put the stick blender all the way to the bottom, turn it on and slowly pull it up to the top. Don't worry if it's not thick enough for a sandwich, this is going to be in dressing.



Rather than get the food processor dirty, add the onion, pickle, garlic, tomato paste and balsamic vinegar to the cup the mayo was in.







Process it with the stick blender -- it doesn't have to be very smooth -- then add it to the mayo and stir.



Check the taste and add black pepper if needed.



And that's it. You could eat this by itself, it's so good.



One extra touch is to add a diced hard-boiled egg.

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Regular readers might notice I did lettuce yesterday and salad dressing today. You might think that means I'll be doing some kind of salad in the next day or two. That's very observant of you. But I'll be you don't expect taco salad.

Okay, now you expect taco salad. This is another one of those "delicious but not pretty enough for company" recipes. Why do we do that? Have favorite recipes that we won't serve to guests? I've never understood that. If you have any recipes that you like, but you won't serve to guests -- or your wife won't let you serve it to them -- post it in the comments. I'm thinking about doing a collection of "Too Good for Company" recipes.

How To Make Chili Sauce For Chili Dogs

With apologies to Samuel Clemens, the difference between a hot dog and a chili dog is like the difference between a lightning-bug and the lightning. A hot dog is something you eat because you're hungry. A chili dog is a meal. But, just like most canned foods, the chili you get in a can isn't worth the time it takes to toss it in the microwave. (Oh, umm ... don't actually toss the can in the microwave. That's not what I meant. That would be bad.)

This chili is not the same as what you'd put on nachos, or eat on its own. First the primary flavor is onion, not tomato or pepper. Second, and more important, is that the meat has to be broken up much finer than normal chili. It has to be chopped fine enough to spread almost like a condiment.

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Ingredients

1 pound ground beef
1 large onion (about one pound)
1/2 cup chili powder (or chile powder [1])
6 tablespoons tomato paste
salt and fresh ground black pepper, to taste

Directions

Brown the ground beef with a few teaspoons of salt over high heat, making sure to crumble it very small.



That tool I'm using was a gift from my wife. When she gave it to me, I really wanted it to not work. I hate single-purpose kitchen tools, and the only thing this is good for is breaking up ground beef. But boy, does it work for that. My chili dogs were always lumpy before I started using this thing. (See that honey? You were right. Thanks for buying it for me.)

While the beef is browning, dice the onion. Add it to the beef ...



... mix it in, and cook until the onion is soft.



Add the tomato paste.



If you're wondering about why it looks like that, I stored the leftovers from the onion ring dipping sauce by freezing it in an ice cube tray. One tablespoon per cube -- yes, I measured -- makes it super convenient.

And if you notice that's not six tablespoons' worth up in the ingredients picture (very observant of you), that's because the last time I did this recipe it was with tomato sauce instead of paste. I wasn't sure how much I was going to need.

Add the chili powder.



Add enough water to dissolve the paste and stir well. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, for about five minutes.



And that's it. Now make your hot dog and/or hot sausage.



No, that picture has nothing to do with the recipe. I'm just showing off my mad grillin' skillz. Here's some more:





Man, I love the return of spring.

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1 "Chile powder" is a single type of chile pepper, dried and ground. "Chili powder" is chile powder plus other spices, usually cumin, salt, garlic and others.

How To Bake A Perfect Baked Potato - BONUS Cucumber And Onion Salad

There are plenty of formulas people use to try to figure out how long to bake a potato. Pretty much everyone agrees that traditional baking makes for the lightest, fluffiest results, but no one knows how long to go.

This simple trick makes it easy to get the perfect spud every time.

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Directions

Start with russets, and one wooden shish-kabob skewer for each one.



Pierce each potato lengthwise with a skewer. Don't hold it this way.



You'll need to push really hard to go through a raw potato. If you go all the way through you can keep going right into your hand. Hold it this way instead.



You probably won't be able to get the skewer all the way through. That's fine, as long as you get at least through the center. Leave a couple of inches sticking out, but break the rest off.



Tear off a piece of foil for each potato, large enough to wrap it completely.



Wet each potato just enough for salt to stick, and coat all the way around with kosher salt.



Wrap the potatoes, and put in the oven at 400° for about 45 minutes.



Now for the trick: Pull gently on the skewer. When it comes out without resistance, it's done.



Seems a little too simple, doesn't it? But yes, it's just that easy. If it doesn't come right out, go another 10 minutes in the oven.

Now that it's perfectly baked, you need to top it. This is a great time to have fresh chives growing outside.



Did you know chives will come back in the spring? I didn't. Totally unexpected, and just in time for the cookout. Cut a little with your kitchen shears or regular scissors.



Slice a potato in half. Cut a cross-hatch pattern in the top and put a pat of butter on each side. Top with some diced chive and serve.



And that's it.

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Bonus - Cucumber and Onion Salad

The cucumber and onion salad you find on a typical salad bar has a mayonnaise-based dressing, which usually means corn syrup as the #1 ingredient. I could fix this problem just by using home-made mayonnaise. But this recipe is even simpler.

This is about the easiest, lightest, freshest-tasting salad you can make. I could easily go through a whole batch of this by myself every week all summer.

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Ingredients

1 large cucumber
1 large sweet onion
(onion and cucumber should be about the same weight)
white vinegar

Directions

Slice the onion into shreds.



Peel the cucumber.



Combine the cucumber and onion in a large bowl.



Realize that the bowl you picked is barely big enough to hold everything, and nowhere near big enough to mix it. (Oops.)



Transfer to a larger bowl.



Combine the cuke and onion by mixing from the bottom.



Transfer to a large container with a tight seal.



Fill with white vinegar ...



... until it's a little less than halfway full.



Fill with water until the veggies are covered, put the lid on and shake well. Leave in the refrigerator overnight, or on the counter for three hours or more before serving.

And that's it.

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Don't forget to subscribe using the link on the right. You won't want to miss tomorrow's chili sauce recipe ... it turns a simple hot dog or polish sausage into a thing of beauty. (Yes, I like food just a little too much.)

How To Slice An Onion Into Shreds

If you're making onion rings, you really have to have rings. It's kind of in the name. For almost anything else it's better to have all the pieces be just about the same size and shape, and the way onions are built that's just not going to happen with rings. (Unless you mince them and mechanically extrude them to make perfect little uniform rings like certain fast "food" places do.)

I covered how to dice an onion a while back. That's great for recipes where you'll be cooking the onion, or for macaroni salad. But for other salads it's probably better to "shred" the onion. No, it's not really shredded, that's just chef talk for "long thin strips". Not only is this the best way to prep onion for salads, it's even easier than dicing.

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Directions

Slice off the root and stem ends.



Lots of cookbooks talk about how to trim really close to the root and stem to minimize waste. If you're working at a restaurant and going through 50-pound sacks of onions every night, go ahead and worry about that last quarter ounce of onion. If I'm only slicing one or two -- or even four or five -- I can live with a little bit of waste. If I were really that worried about waste I'd have a compost heap.

Now set the onion on one of the new cuts and slice it in half.



It should be pretty easy now to peel the papery outer layer off.



If you're having trouble, use a paring knife to get under the edge and peel it that way.

Once it's peeled, take one half and cut it in half again from end to end.



Starting from the center, where you just made the last cut, start slicing until you get about halfway to the edge ...



... and it's too skinny to be stable.



Then lay the end piece down ...



... and keep going, starting from the small side. Notice that I'm guiding the knife with knuckles on my left hand ...



... with the fingertips tucked back.



No one wants fingernails in their food. Keep going until you get to the edge.




Repeat this for the other pieces, or put the rest away for the next meal. That's the other good thing about this way of cutting: it's very easy to cut a half or even a quarter of an onion.

Separate any pieces that are stuck together.



And that's it.

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Don't miss the thrilling followup, How To Peel A Cucumber, and the edge-of-your-seat excitement of Cucumber and Onion Salad, coming up later this week. Sign up for my email or RSS reed in the column to the right.

How To Make Grandma's Apple Cider Sweet Onion Sauce

Last week my wife was making hamburgers for dinner, and grilled some onions for them. She added a little sugar, something she learned from her father. As I was eating, I thought, "This would be really good on ribs." I went looking and found a bunch of recipes for onion-based babecue sauces, but all of them had at least as much tomato paste, ketchup or chile peppers as they had onion. What you see below is the experiment that came from that.

Was the experiment a success? Let's just say it's a good thing I made so much of it. My wife is already planning on using it on chicken and pork chops in the next couple of days. It's just as good for dipping as it is for a glaze.

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Ingredients

4 large sweet onions, a little more than 4 pounds (Vidalia are good, I used Texas Sweet this time)
2 whole heads garlic
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup apple cider vinegar
2 teaspoons ground cardamom
1 teaspoon cumin
4 tablespoons rendered bacon fat (see first paragraph below)
salt and pepper to taste

Directions

One great timesaving tip when you cook from scratch is plan meals for the same week where you can prepare part of one meal at the same time you're doing another. What I did here was to make the sauce for my weekend cookout after I finished cooking the bacon for BLTs. I was going to need some of the bacon fat anyway, and doing it in this order meant I only had to clean that pan once instead of twice.

I could also prep the onions while waiting for the bacon to cook. Since I wasn't dicing the onions, I did a quicker technique. Slice off the stem and root, set the onion on one of the flat spots you just cut, and slice it in half.



This makes it really easy to peel the outer, papery layer off. Then slice from one side across until the un-cut piece is tall and skinny and wants to tip over when you try to cut it.



Lay this piece down and slice the rest of the way across.



I was able to do all four onions in about two minutes, without even doing that crazy-fast chopping all the TV chefs do to show off. (Although if anyone had been watching, you better believe I would have gone as fast as possible.)



I put the sliced onions in the large pot instead of in a bowl because I was going to be reducing the sauce in that pot after cooking the onion. No reason to dirty an extra bowl if you don't have to.

Now comes the time saver I mentioned above: the pan I just cooked the bacon in.



I just finished a pound-and-a-half, done in four batches, in the largest stainless steel pan I had. Normally I'd go with either cast iron or non-stick for bacon. But since I was going to be doing the onions, I wanted to get a bit more of the bacon flavor. Besides that, as the onions give up their moisture, it deglazes the pan making it easier to clean. Bonus.

So I set up a little workstation with the frying pan, the onions, and the rendered fat I had just poured out of the pan and filtered. Make sure there is a generous coating of melted fat still in the pan.



You want to use the largest pan you have. The onion caramelizes better when it's in contact with the surface, so work in batches and don't crowd it.



While the first batch is sautéing over medium-low heat, peel all the garlic.



Don't chop, mince or crush the garlic.

Cook the onions, stirring occasionally, until they are dark brown and very soft. Remove the onions, and put the whole garlic cloves in the pan along with another tablespoon of bacon fat. Cook the garlic, shaking the pan frequently, until it is well browned and soft to the touch.



Add the next batch of onion in with the garlic and cook as before, stirring occasionally until the onion is dark brown and very soft.



At this point the onion should already be very sweet. I had my wife taste it and she stood there eating it until I made her stop so I'd have some left for the weekend. She said it was like candy.

Transfer all the onions and garlic to a heavy-bottomed pot.



Since this will be simmering for a while you don't want the hot spots you get with thin pans, or the onion will burn.

Deglaze the pan with the cider vinegar and add that to the onions.

Using a stick blender, process the onion directly in the pot. If you don't have a stick blender, you'll need to do this step in a food processor before returning it to the pot.



You're done when it's a smooth, even consistency.



It will look almost like applesauce and, thanks to the cider vinegar, it will even taste surprisingly like applesauce.

Add the cardamom and cumin ...



... and the brown sugar ...



... and process again until the seasonings are mixed in well. Check the flavor and add salt and pepper as needed. Making this for myself, I'd go very heavy on the black pepper. Since this was going to be for the whole family I left it more mild, maybe only one or two teaspoons. Since I had used a pan that still had the bacon drippings, I only needed about a teaspoon of salt.

Now cover the pot with either a vented lid, or with the lid partially open, over very low heat. The bubbles from this will make a huge mess if you don't keep something over the pot, but you want the steam to escape. Simmer until the sauce has reduced and thickened. How thick, exactly? Enough to stick to ribs when you put them on the grill. Shoot for the same consistency as whatever store-bough barbecue sauce you usually like.



Compare this to the photo up top where I had just sliced the onions, and you can see how much it cooked down. Transfer the sauce to a sealed container and store in the refrigerator until you use it.

And that's it.

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NOTE: This sauce was made to go on grilled ribs. Subscribe to my feed with the link in the column to the right to see the recipe for that as soon as it comes out. You'll see it in time to do the cider sweet onion glazed ribs -- with the old-fashioned macaroni salad -- this weekend.

How To Make Old-Fashioned Macaroni Salad

I've never liked the pre-made macaroni salad you get at the grocery store, with over-cooked noodles swimming in in runny, watery dressing. This version comes out nearly dry, the pasta soaking up most of the dressing, and with a bit of crunch from the veggies. You can easily substitute cooked, cubed potatoes for the macaroni and have a really good potato salad.

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Ingredients

one pound elbow macaroni
1/2 sweet onion
two stalks celery, green part only
one cup mayonnaise
three tablespoons white vinegar
one teaspoon celery seed
4-6 large hard-boiled eggs (see note on presentation)

Directions

Boil the eggs and cook the pasta the way you normally do. When the pasta is done and you have drained it in a collander, mix it under cold running water until it is completely cool. If you use your hand to mix it, you'll be able to tell when it's cooled down.

While the pasta is cooking, dice the onion and celery according to the directions for making mirepoix.



I've made this salad a hundred times using store-bought mayonnaise, so that's what I showed in the ingredients. If you're serving this with a main dish that's going to take a lot of attention, like the ribs I served them with, you might want to save yourself the trouble of making the mayo. (Subscribe to my RSS feed in the column to the right to get the recipe for the ribs and home-made cider onion sauce as soon as I finish writing it up.)

Since you already have the eggs and vinegar out, though, you'll never have a better time to give it a try. Just use:

1 extra large egg
1-1/2 teaspoons white vinegar
1 teaspoon mustard powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
3/4 cup olive pomace oil

Put the ingredients in a tall, narrow cup or jar in the order listed, lower a stick blender in, turn it on and slowly pull it up to the top. Instant mayonnaise. Pour it into the macaroni.



Or add one cup of prepared mayonnaise.

Add the onion, celery, vinegar and celery seed and mix well. Scoop down along the side using a silicone or rubber spatula, and lift from the center.



Here's a quick clip showing what I'm talking about.



Dice four of the eggs according to the directions for how to dice hard boiled eggs. It's easiest do the third slice directly over the bowl.



Mix again, gently so you don't mash up the egg. You want both the white and yellow bits to stay whole.



And that's it.

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Presentation

If you are taking this to a potluck, the traditional presentation is to slice a couple more eggs and place the rings on top, the way I did in potato salad with bacon and egg.

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A note about personal taste

I brought some of this over to my in-laws, and my father-in-law noted how much drier it was than what he is used to. There's two parts to this. First, yes it is drier. That's how I like it. Second, the macaroni will soak up a lot of the mayonnaise overnight. I usually add more when I'm having leftovers.

How To Make Onion Rings From Scratch

This version has a very simple, very light tempura style batter. It's about the simplest batter possible, and I can guarantee that if you cook at all, you've already got everything you need in the cupboard.

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Ingredients

1 large onion per 2 servings
1 cup flour
1 large egg
1 cup ice water
salt
pepper

Directions

While preparing the onions and batter, set your cooking fat on medium heat to warm up. I prefer beef tallow, but would use lard or olive pomace oil in a pinch. Vegetable oil -- corn, soybean, etc. -- has too low a smokepoint and turns rancid too easily. Plus it's not reusable.



While that's heating up, peel the onion (or onions) and slice into wide rings.



The best onions to use are very large diameter and wider than they are tall. This gives you more large rings than small ones.

When you get to the end with the root, stick a paring knife in at an angle toward the center ...



... and spin it around until you get the whole root out.



Pop out the center pieces of each slice that are either not round, or too small to make good onion rings.



Some onions hold on really strong between the layers. If you have one of these, you need to break the layers loose before trying to separate the rings or they'll all break. Place the ring between your palms, squeeze in enough to make it a little bit oval, and roll it back and forth a few times.



Once it's loosened up, pop the rings apart, starting from the inside.



Once it's all separated, one onion makes a surprisingly large pile of rings. I completely underestimated the size of the bowl I'd need to hold it all.



Now mix up the batter -- that's the flour, egg and water -- according to the directions in the flounder tempura posting, and salt and pepper. Set your onions and batter up next to the hot fat.



Using metal or high-temperature plastic tongs, dip the rings one at a time into the batter. Make sure each ring is covered all the way around. This batter is very thin, so let the batter drip off for a second before putting it in the fat.