The Russian salad is an easy salad to make for your family and friends. This is usually prepared for special occasions. I first got a taste when I went to Manila. (Back when I was provincial, all salad by default is fruit salad or buko salad. Salad and sweet is the default combination). It’s colorful, and tasty, and you can design it in the colors of your flag!

I really didn’t know it’s difference with potato salad before I wrote this article. Potato salad is just mainly potato. Russian salad is potato salad with vegetables. Sometimes with beet that makes it a bit purple. :P

It has a really interesting history worth of a movie too. It was invented by a French restaurant owner in Russia named Lucien Olivier. The recipe was so secret and his sous chef invented a commotion just to get the chef out of the kitchen and sneaked in to see what his ingredients are. He then quit and joined another restaurant to serve a not so surprisingly similar recipe. Too bad he wasn’t able to capture all of the ingredients though, because it is said that something was missing from his copied recipe.

Here’s a recipe, definitely a shorter and simpler one though. Because the original one, which the recipe creator never wrote and took to his grave, had as much as 100 ingredients!

Russian Salad

• 1/2 kilo potatoes, cooked, peeled and cubed
• 2 medium-size beets, cooked, peeled and cubed
• 1 medium-size carrot, cooked, peeled and cubed
• 1 stalk celery, blanched and chopped
• 1 cup diced Baguio beans, blanched
• 1/3 cup pickle relish
• 1/2 cup flaked cooked chicken
• 1/2 cup diced ham
• 2 cups mayonnaise sugar, salt and pepper to taste
• hard boiled eggs (for garnish)

Toss all vegetables together with chicken and ham. Add in the mayonnaise. Blend well then season to taste. Serve cold on a bed of lettuce.

Notes:

I think this is a good dish that you can prepare ahead. The flavors really come together after a day in the refrigerator. For the potatoes, I really love how Julia Child prepare hers which is to cook it then, marinate it in vinegar and the potato water or chicken stock. See more here:  Julia Child Potato Salad.