Green Bean and Potato Salad
Note: When local farmer's markets are carrying fresh-picked green beans and potatoes, use them in this recipe. It makes a difference! Four of my old recipes reflect the different ways to make a green bean-potato salad, each containing some basic ingredients. One resembles an antipasto salad, one epicurious.com recipe (called "Salad Nicoise") contains shrimp, scallops, and anchovies.
The Soho Antipasto from Playboy Magazine has no potatoes, but the green beans are served with green and black olives, mozarella cheese, and pepperoni and an herbal vinaigrette. It calls for a garnish of anchovies, marinated artichoke hearts, and chicory leaves.
This recipe compiles the base ingredients into a mixture that could go either way. The epicurious.com lime vinaigrette below was used to marinate fish and drizzle on the salad. Or, use your favorite vinaigrette recipe. Tarragon vinager also goes very nicely in this combination with a little olive oil and sugar.
For the salad:
1 lb potatoes, sliced in 1/4" thick slices (about 3 cps)
1 lb green beans, sliced (or one pkg frozen)
2 T shallots or green onions, minced
1 clove garlic
1 red or green bell pepper, sliced
1 t cumin
cherry or slicing tomatoes, to taste
1/2-1 jalapeno pepper, minced if available, or ground cayenne pepper to taste
For the lime vinaigrette:
8 T olive oil
3 T fresh lime juice
1/2 t black pepper
1/8 t grated lime peel
1/4 t minced garlic.