Learn how to use clean ingredients to make classic potato salad in a fraction of the time using your Instant Pot!
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Summer vacation bliss!
The best. I’m so thankful for you all being so gracious with me while I took some time off to enjoy the summer sun. Thank you! We just got back from the best time of Petoskey stone hunting, wave riding, river bank hiking, and family time.
Summer routine
And as much fun as we had for a get-away, I’m ready to hop back into our “at home” summer routine. Part of that summer routine means having cold salads on hand for quick lunch or dinner side dishes. It gives us a chance to be outdoors as much as possible and still keep the food on our plates real food so we aren’t tempted to eat junk or go out to eat.
My summer salad and side staples
Coleslaw is one of my staple veggie side dishes for summer weekdays. I make it up on Sunday nights and use it for the first half of the week. I also like making our favorite fresh herb filled Paleo Ranch for cold veggie platter dipping or big salad sides. And this summer, potato salad has made one of my summer side staples thanks to my Instant Pot!
Potato salad for more than just that special picnic!
If you were to ask me last year if potato salad was one of my summer staple sides, I would have probably told you no. The time it takes to boil the potatoes was more than I am willing to do for anything more than a special picnic occasion. But my goodness has the Instant Pot changed that for me! In about 10 minutes of time including chopping, cooking, mixing, and clean up, I can have a week’s worth of potato salad ready to go for dinner sides to partner grilled hamburgers and barbeque chicken, or a lunch bowl topped with some crushed walnuts!
Pile it all in!
No really! Just add a cup of water to the bottom of your IP, place a steamer basket down at the bottom, and pile on the cubed potatoes! (I don’t even peel the potatoes, although you may if you wish!) You can just toss the eggs right on the top of the potatoes, and once the Instant Pot comes to pressure, you’re 3 minutes away from perfectly cooked potatoes and hard boiled eggs. And you can totally tailor this to your taste. If you like more or less eggs, you can certainly adjust that! If you like a crisper potato in your potato salad, back the time off to 1 minute. (You may need to pressure cook your eggs separately to get them fully hard boiled if you back off on the potato cooking time).
That dressing, though!
While I’m all about the Instant Pot magic, the dressing is really where it’s at. If your dressing is boring and bland, your potato salad isn’t going to taste great. While your potatoes and eggs are pressure cooking, whisk up this amazing dressing – your family will be licking their plates clean because of this part! The key is to add the dressing to the potatoes while they are still warm, so they soak up all the flavor. This also makes the prep part go super fast! You don’t need to wait for the potatoes to cool down at all!
Mayonnaise options
There are a lot of different options for the mayonnaise part. Browse through this list, and see what fits your family best!
- I love and use the Sir Kensington’s Avocado Oil Mayo. You can find it just about anywhere these days. Just be sure it is the avocado oil mayo – the “classic” mayo in this brand uses sunflower oil, and you want to avoid that.
- While I absolutely LOVE my Paleo Avocado Mayo recipe, it does turn the potato salad a different color, so I tend to use regular mayo for this salad. If that is the kind of mayo you tolerate, and you don’t mind the change in color, I have made it using that Paleo mayo recipe and it tastes SO good!
- If you can’t have the eggs in homemade mayo or store bought, you can try my egg free mayo recipe (this recipe does have dairy, but I think you could swap the sour cream for plain coconut milk yogurt if you do not tolerate dairy).
- I also wanted to add that plain sour cream works well for a mayo sub if that is what you have and can tolerate dairy.
Other ingredient notes and swaps
- Your potato salad will feel a bit different if you use yellow or red potatoes. Russets are “drier” and have more room for absorbing the dressing which is why I like using them. Red/yellow potatoes will work, but I think you might want to adjust the time for cooking since they tend to cook faster and get softer.
- If you can’t have eggs, simply leave them out! I use duck eggs a lot since that is what we tolerate best.
- I have been picking up the Bubbies pickle relish this summer and *loving* it! If you can’t find that, you can just chop up regular pickles (we like the Bubbies fermented pickles) for the chopped pickle ingredient. Just watch your ingredients – bread and butter pickles have a ton of added sugar.
Healthy Instant Pot Potato Salad
Ingredients
- 1 cup water
- 3 lbs Russet potatoes cubed (It’s been about 6 medium sized potatoes for me)
- 4 pastured chicken or duck eggs optional if you don’t tolerate eggs
- 1 cup of your favorite mayonnaise I like Sir Kensington's Avocado Oil Mayonnaise
. See above "Mayo Options" section for more choices. You can use homemade mayo, or your favorite mayo made with avocado oil or olive oil. If you tolerate dairy, full fat sour cream works fantastic too. We avoid mayos with soy and/or canola oils.
- 2 ½ tbsp Dijon mustard regular mustard works just fine here too
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tbsp raw honey
- Juice of ½ lemon
- 1 ½ - 2 tsp sea salt to taste start low and you can always add more to your taste
- ½ tsp paprika I love the flavor that smoked paprika gives if you can find that
- ¼ tsp pepper
- Pinch of cayenne
- ½ tsp dried dill or about 1 tbsp fresh chopped dill
- 1/3 cup chopped pickles
- ½ cup green onion
. See above "Mayo Options" section for more choices. You can use homemade mayo, or your favorite mayo made with avocado oil or olive oil. If you tolerate dairy, full fat sour cream works fantastic too. We avoid mayos with soy and/or canola oils.Instructions
- Put the water in the bottom of your Instant Pot liner, and place a steamer basket inside. Put the cubed potatoes in a steamer basket, and lay the uncooked eggs (in their shell) on top of the potatoes.
- Put the lid on your Instant Pot, close the valve, make sure the pressure is set to “High,” and press “Manual.” Bring the time down to 3 minutes. The Instant Pot will take about 5 or so minutes to come to pressure before counting down the 3 minutes.
- While the potatoes and eggs are cooking, make the dressing. Whisk the mayonnaise, mustard, olive oil, honey, lemon juice, sea salt, paprika, pepper, and cayenne in a small mixing bowl, and chop your pickles and green onion.
- When the Instant Pot beeps that the 3 minutes of pressure cooking is done, turn the IP off, and turn the valve to release all the pressure. Take the lid off the Instant Pot, and use tongs to place the eggs in a bowl of cold water to cool off so you can peel them.
- While the eggs are cooling off, you can scoop the cooked potatoes into a mixing bowl. Pour the whisked dressing over the potatoes and stir to combine. Peel and chop the hard boiled eggs, and then fold in the chopped eggs, dill, pickles, and green onion.
- Chill the potato salad and then taste for sea salt and pepper.
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