Why Guy Fieri's German Potato Salad Has Way More Flavor Than Yours

Potato salad is one of those classic dishes for hot summer barbecues because it's filling, hearty, and typically served cold. I don't think it's especially controversial to say I prefer hot potatoes, though, and for that you want a German potato salad. Besides the temperature, an important ingredient that makes German potato salad unique is the vinegar dressing, which is swapped for the mayonnaise-based dressing you see in American-style potato salad. Bacon bits are another common sight in German potato salad. And in a really good recipe, there might be more bacon than meets the eye, especially if you ask Guy Fieri.

In an episode of his Food Network show "Guy's Big Bite," Fieri broke down his take on German potato salad, and he specified that you should be cooking those potatoes in leftover bacon fat. On the show, Fieri first cooks the potatoes about three-quarters of the way in water before draining and drying them. He then places a single piece of chopped potato into a skillet of bacon fat and a little extra vegetable oil. If the potato starts sizzling, he dumps in the rest and the results are extra crisp and flavorful. He also tops it off with some Dijon mustard and capers while they're still cooking in the skillet.

Letting the potatoes finish cooking in bacon drippings is somewhat similar to Guy Fieri's trick for taking bland spuds into Flavortown via cooking them in a salt brine. Fortunately, the bacon drippings trick is easy to do. Assuming you're adding bacon to the German potato salad anyway, you can cook the bacon as normal and simply leave the leftover fat in the skillet. Here, the bacon grease serves as a substitute for butter or oil while providing some umami seasoning. Some folks call it a bacon vinaigrette since it ends up being combined with vinegar in the finished dish. If done right, the potatoes will take on deep, rich flavors from the bacon.

Putting aside some issues with the name (what Americans call German potato salad is often called southern German potato salad in Germany), most German potato salad will have a standard set of ingredients. Certain versions require mustard, as Fieri uses in his version, and lots of recipes suggest adding onions which you can also cook in the bacon fat with the potatoes so they absorb that flavor. If your potato salad still needs more help, another secret to amazing potato salad is the classic seafood seasoning Old Bay, which would easily blend in with the other ingredients here.