There are so many types of potato salad out there made across the world. But sometimes, it’s hard to beat a cookout classic dressed up with mayonnaise, crunchy celery, zippy onion, and perfectly-cooked hard-boiled eggs. That’s exactly what Chef John’s recipe inherited from his mom serves up: an aptly named Perfect Potato Salad. 

In that recipe, Chef John highlights one very important rule in making this potato salad: After cooking whole potatoes, they must come down to room temperature before you combine them with the remaining ingredients and toss them with your dressing. If you dress your potatoes while they’re still hot, the mayo-based dressing will end up looking greasy and unappetizing. 

Waiting for the potatoes to cool has another bonus. For this potato salad, you start by boiling whole, skin-on potatoes as opposed to cut or peeled potatoes. Then you peel and cut the potatoes after they’ve been cooked. Peeling cooked, room-temperature potatoes is much easier than peeling raw potatoes. Because the potato skin peels so easily from the flesh of the potato, you also waste less of the potato. 

That’s not Chef John’s only potato salad tip. Here are his top tips for making a perfect potato salad.

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