French Potato Salad -- Cold Supper Never Looked So Good

Hot week. The kind of Vermont hot that people from Texas would laugh at — eighties, maybe touching ninety — but we're not built for it up here, and neither are the houses. The farmhouse has no air conditioning because it was built in the 1880s by people who assumed that if God wanted you to be cool in July, He wouldn't have invented July. So we open the windows, run the fans Helen bought at the hardware store in 2003, and complain. Complaining about the heat is the one form of complaining that Vermont permits. Everything else, you endure silently. But the heat? Go ahead. Let it out.

I didn't cook much this week. Too hot for the oven, too hot for the stove, too hot for anything that involves standing in a kitchen and generating additional warmth. Instead, I made cold things. A cucumber salad — thin slices of cucumber from the garden, soaked in white vinegar with sugar, salt, and dill. My mother made this every summer. It takes five minutes and tastes like July. You put it in the refrigerator and forget about it for an hour and then you eat half the bowl standing at the counter with a fork because it's too hot to sit down.

Also made iced tea. Not the powdered kind, not the bottled kind — real iced tea, brewed strong, cooled, poured over ice with a lemon slice. I know iced tea is not a recipe. It's barely cooking. But on a day when it's eighty-seven degrees and the dog has moved under the porch to escape the sun and your shirt is stuck to your back by ten in the morning, a glass of iced tea with ice that cracks when you pour the tea over it is as close to salvation as a kitchen can provide.

Frost spent the entire week under the porch or on the bathroom tiles, which are the coolest surface in the house. He looked at me like I had personally arranged the weather. I explained to him that I'm a retired English teacher, not a meteorologist, and he didn't seem convinced.

Helen came home from the hospital on Wednesday and said two words: "Cold supper." So we had cold supper — sliced ham, the cucumber salad, some bread, cheese, and the strawberry jam from last week's batch. There's a beauty in cold supper. No cooking. No heat. Just a plate of things that are already done, already cold, already perfect. Sometimes the best meal is the one that asks the least of you.

The forecast says the heat breaks Friday. We'll survive until then. We always do. Vermonters are nothing if not stubborn about surviving.

The cucumber salad got most of the glory this week, but it was the French potato salad — made the same afternoon, dressed in vinegar and herbs while the potatoes were still just barely warm — that held the cold supper together. No mayonnaise, no oven required after boiling, and it only gets better the longer it sits in the refrigerator. Helen didn’t say much when she got home Wednesday, but she went back for seconds of this one, which in our house counts as a standing ovation.

French Potato Salad

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 35 min (plus 30 min chilling) | Servings: 6

Ingredients

• 2 lbs small waxy potatoes (such as Yukon Gold or fingerlings), scrubbed
• 1 tsp kosher salt, plus more for boiling
• 3 tbsp white wine vinegar, divided
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 small red onion, very thinly sliced
• 2 tbsp capers, drained
• 3 tbsp fresh flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped
• 2 tbsp fresh chives, thinly sliced
• 1 tbsp fresh tarragon leaves (or 1/2 tsp dried)

Instructions

1. Boil the potatoes. Place potatoes in a large pot and cover with cold salted water by at least an inch. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce to a steady simmer. Cook 15–18 minutes, until a knife slides through the center of the largest potato with no resistance.
2. Slice while warm. Drain the potatoes and let them cool just enough to handle — about 5 minutes. Slice into 1/4-inch rounds (or halve fingerlings lengthwise). Spread in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet or wide bowl.
3. Dress immediately. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons of the vinegar directly over the warm potato slices and toss gently. The potatoes will absorb the vinegar as they cool, which is the whole point.
4. Make the vinaigrette. In a small bowl, whisk together the remaining 1 tablespoon vinegar, olive oil, Dijon mustard, 1 tsp kosher salt, and black pepper until emulsified.
5. Combine and toss. Transfer potatoes to a serving bowl. Add the red onion, capers, parsley, chives, and tarragon. Pour the vinaigrette over and fold gently to combine without breaking up the slices.
6. Chill and serve. Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before serving. This salad is best served cool or at room temperature — not cold from the refrigerator. Taste and adjust seasoning before bringing to the table.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 185 | Protein: 3g | Fat: 7g | Carbs: 28g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 390mg