Crunchy potato salad with bonus biltong

When devising this recipe, I was focused on crunch. So my mind went to celery, radishes, red onion, and fresh “baby” ginger — this is sold by Checkers these days, and it is easy to identify from mature ginger. Its skin is paler and softer. And when you chop it finely, it has some good crunch. So it was perfect for this recipe.

I also included some very fresh, perky garlic, plenty of coriander leaves and their stems, finely chopped, and to finish the salad off I toasted some walnuts and chopped them up, to be scattered on top as a final crunchy flourish.

The coriander stems made the grade because they too are crunchy, and of course they hold the strongest flavours coriander has to offer. (Those cursed with having been born with the Soapy Coriander Chromosome will have to leave it out.)

Meanwhile, there was soft biltong in the mix too, both inside and a few slices scattered on top.

Bringing it all together is a spiky dressing of fynbos vinegar, lemon juice and zest and olive oil, mixed with mayonnaise.

Tony’s crunchy potato salad with bonus biltong

(Serves 8 as a side dish)

Ingredients

32 baby potatoes, unpeeled

½ cup of finely chopped soft biltong

10 or 12 slices of biltong for garnish

1 small red onion, halved and then sliced thinly

 2 stalks of celery, diced

4 to 6 radishes (depending on their size), diced

2 or 3 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped

3cm piece of baby ginger, peeled and diced very small

A handful of fresh coriander, including the stems, finely chopped

1 cup decent quality mayonnaise

3 Tbsp Rozendal fynbos vinegar, or other slightly sweet vinegar

Zest and juice of 1 ripe lemon

3 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Salt and black pepper, to taste

A handful of walnuts, toasted and then crushed

Method

Put the potatoes in a pot of plenty of well-salted cold water, put it on the highest heat, and bring it to a boil. Boil for about 20 minutes or until the potatoes are just soft enough (they mustn’t fall apart), then tip into a colander and leave to cool. When a bamboo skewer slides through them easily but with a small degree of resistance, they’re done.

Toast the walnuts lightly in a dry pan on a moderate heat. Leave them to cool, then crush them on a board with a rolling pin (don’t press too hard). Leave aside.

Choose a large, deep salad bowl. Add the dressing ingredients to the bowl first: spoon in the mayonnaise, fynbos vinegar, lemon juice, zest and olive oil, season with salt and black pepper, and stir.

Rinse all the vegetables and pat dry. Prepare the vegetables and biltong, putting everything in a deep bowl as you work:

Peel the red onion, cut it in half, then slice it thinly.

Top and tail the celery and dice it.

Trim the radishes and slice thinly, then turn them on their flat sides and cut into tiny dice.

Peel the garlic and slice very thinly, then turn it on its flat side and chop very finely.

Peel the baby ginger and dice very small.

Chop the coriander finely, in the same way that you chop parsley finely. Include the stems too, as they have lots of flavour and are pleasantly crunchy.

Chop up the biltong (excluding the slices needed for garnish) and add it to the mix.

Everything is now in the bowl, except the potatoes. Give it a stir so that everything is combined.

Once the potatoes have cooled to room temperature, slice them in half and add them to the dressing in the bowl.

Toss gently using two round-edged wooden spoons, so that you don’t break the potatoes up.

Dress the salad with some strips of biltong.

Scatter the crushed walnuts over. DM

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Tony Jackman is twice winner of the Galliova Food Writer of the Year award.

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