Schwäbischer Kartoffelsalat

Schwäbischer Kartoffelsalat belongs to the south-west table, beside Schnitzel, grilled sausages, roast pork, or a cold supper with bread and pickles. It travels well to a picnic or a Vereinsfest, the club potluck, because it doesn't lean on mayonnaise. Im Norden anders, im Süden anders. The north likes it creamy and white; Swabia wants it warm-dressed, sharp, glossy, and loose enough to move in the bowl.

The technique is simple and unforgiving: slice the potatoes while they're still warm and dress them with hot broth first. Warm potato has open starch at the cut surface, so it drinks the broth and turns schlotzig, the Swabian word for juicy and silky, not wet and not dry. Cold potato sits there like a coin and lets the dressing run off. Then you've made sliced potatoes in vinegar. Sad work.

Use waxy potatoes, not floury ones. A floury potato falls apart and turns the bowl to paste; a waxy one keeps its edges while the surface softens just enough to bind the dressing. The broth matters too. Beef broth if you're keeping the old table, vegetable broth if the meal is meatless, but not a salty cube bullied into water. Nicht aus dem Glas if the jar tastes of nothing.

Let it draw an hour before serving. Das braucht seine Zeit. Taste only after the potatoes have taken the broth, because vinegar and salt shout at first and settle later. Chives at the end, oil after the broth, and no mayonnaise near the bowl. Das ist kein Bierzelt.