On Direct to the Palate we love the Russian salad, that great bar classic that great chefs also claim and that each family boasts of having the best recipe. The basic preparation of cooked potato and mayonnaise can be identified in countless variants, and although we all have our favorite salad, there are always ways to raise it to a higher category.
With more or less ingredients, very sweet or minced potato, with or without peas; the open fronts separate national tastes When it comes to positioning ourselves on the salad, they give rise to more complex debates than the classic potato omelette and the onion dilemma.
Without going into the evaluation of the different more classic variants, which basically respond a little to the tradition of the region where we grew up -and the particular taste-, we propose enriching our favorite salad by adding more special ingredients to the mixture, or crowning the dish with them as a gourmet icing.
And if you are not lucky enough to have inherited a recipe from your family, all you have to do is take a look at our complete recipe book with options for Russian salad for all tastes and colors, from the most classic with the advice of Juan Pozuelo, to variants with artichokes, marinated salmon and avocado, lighter or the curious Puerto Rican alternative with apple.
Seafood preserves beyond tuna
Tuna in oil is the most common, natural it is less caloric and others prefer the marinade, but if we invest a little more in the marinated laterío our salad can take on a completely different air. In addition to the more obvious alternative of betting on a good tuna belly, we have more canned and semi-canned fish to choose.
Small sardines, anchovies, anchovies, horse mackerel, mackerel, marlin, mackerel, salmon or sea bream are fish that we can find preserved, but also molluscs, crustaceans and cephalopods: cockles, scallops, scallops, octopus, crab meat -really, no surimi-, mussels, clams, etc.
Depending on the investment and the intensity of the product, we can add it to the base of the salad or use it as crown in presentation, or combine both options. You don’t have to cook anything and it’s hard to go wrong.
Albacore tuna in olive oil Amaiketako 225gr
Rosa Lafuente – Natural cockles from the Galician Rías 25 pieces
good seafood
It’s another obvious choice if we mention canned seafood: go for the fresh product. Depending on what our trusted fishmonger offers us, we can afford to buy red or white prawns in season, quality prawns or a good octopus leg, which once cooked saves us complications.
King prawns, shrimp and crayfish can be through the roof so buy one or two units only as a garnish of the salad is not such an unreasonable luxury; and if we have lobster or lobster at a good price, don’t hesitate.
Fresh fish
It requires a little more work, but in the end it is minimal. Cooking seasonal fish instead of throwing in preserves, it will give us another dimension to the salad, both with blue fish -bluefin or almadraba tuna, bonito, mackerel, sardines, horse mackerel- and with white fish.
Cod is a good option, and also a hake of quality, such as the acclaimed salad of La Sirena, in Alicante. Our recipe with lobster monkfish also ensures success at the table.
different pickles
The Russian salad of Tapas 24, winner of San Sebastián Gastronomika 2018.
in Murcia the salad is prepared with variations instead of cooked vegetables, and for me there is no comparison. They must be chosen wisely so that they do not take center stage, but they do provide a very special flavor and texture, enhancing the flatter flavor of the potato.
If you don’t want to go overboard with the flavor, you can choose to add a moderate touch by chopping some good pickles, but there are more pickled vegetables that we can use: carrot, cauliflower, onion, pepper, capers, etc. Of course, the chili peppers They are another excellent choice, perfect as the crown of the plate.
quality olives
We insist on quality; a good olive You can’t buy it with the cheap supermarket prices, no matter how much we like them for a fix. The case of the black ones is especially significant, avoid the corchopán ones at all costs and choose a good one from Aragón, cuquillo type or even the Greek Kalamata ones.
Dcoop Alorean Green Olives, 400g
In Spain we have excellent olives of different sizes and flavor with its own name, such as gordal, manzanilla, aloreña, hojiblanca, mollar… Raw or marinated, they will enrich the salad mixture if they are chopped or chopped, and they are also excellent as a dressing.
fried quail eggs
It is very typical to reserve an egg to chop the white and/or grate the yolk as a decoration and toppingas we usually do in our house salads, but we also like the option that we tried from Dani García in his already mythical Russian salad, finishing it with some fried quail eggs that add that crunchy touch.
Herbs, sprouts and flowers
The Half Ration salad, at the Hotel Urso.
In the chef’s salads there is an abundance of chopped fresh chives; It is a wonderful herb that provides color and freshness without being too excessive, in perfect pairing with the components of the dish. But you can encourage yourself to experiment with other scents, always in moderation; a little dill never goes wrong with fish, parsley never fails and cilantro, whoever likes it, always surprises with its versatility.
We can also put them fresh as they are -always well washed and dried-, whole or chopped, or also fries to give it another point of crunchy texture, as Dani García also does in the aforementioned salad in his restaurants.
To get finer we can decorate our salad with germinated or microgreensalso very much to the taste of professionals, as well as flowers foods that give joy and color. The garlic ones, in addition to being pretty, are very aromatic.
Tobiko, caviar and other roe
The Russian salad of La Maruca.
Fish roe and its vegetable versions -based on algae- provide that touch of luxury and elegance that many chefs like to use to finish off their salads, but they also enrich the bite with their explosion of flavors to pure sea
There are different caliber, color and texture, as well as price. It is not necessary to buy authentic sturgeon caviar -lucky one who can-, but the tobiko Japanese, a decent substitute or other fish roe They are not particularly expensive and they look great.
Iberian ham and other cured meats
The famous Russian from La Cosmopolita.
One of the most acclaimed salads from Spain, that of La Cosmopolita, in Malaga, has a very simple base of potato, carrot and egg, with an impeccable homemade mayonnaise, and is finished off with good Iberian ham, which provides luxury, flavor, color and texture. You can add it more chopped, in cubes or strips that are not very large.
Who says Iberian ham says cured meats to taste; If you have a more modest ham, you can leave it crispy by roasting it in the oven as in this recipe, or use cecina, loin, fuet, a good salami, duck ham, etc. Crispy bacon, without going overboard, can also be a scandal.
Mojama, botarga, roe or ling
Sea ham is the excellent salted fish that is produced in the south and southeast of our country, with a long tradition inherited from the almadrabas. The tuna mojama can be added cut into thin slices, minced or in very thin strips. If it is of quality, it is a delicacy that does not have to envy the product of the pig.
The salted roe, like the mullet or lingor the Italian version of the botarga, can also be cut thin but they give better results, in this case, if the we grate very finely, as if they were Parmesan cheese. The flavor shot umami and aroma that they inject into any dish is spectacular.
Fried onion and garlic chips
The typical fried onion of hot dogs and salads style diner It is an undervalued ingredient cheap resource to enhance flavors and textures in all kinds of dishes. You have to like onion, obviously, but the little touch it adds to a creamy salad, whatever its ingredients, deserves to be tried.
Dani – Fried onion 120 gr.
You also have to be a fan of garlic to appreciate the garlic chips; if this is your case, do not hesitate to cut some fine cloves -without going overboard, they will burn in a sigh- and fry them until golden brown without sizzling. Tasty and crispy, they also look great when “prick” into the dough.
Spherifications or pearls
It is not a matter of starting to spherify at home for snack time; fortunately the fashion that unleashed the revolution of molecular cuisine of El Bulli allow us to find a multitude of commercial products that manage any dish.
Olive oil, paprika, truffle, spicy, olives, Sherry, vermouth, wasabi, vinegar… called spheres, dropsdrops or pearls, we will find a good catalog in supermarkets, specialized stores or online platforms. If we don’t give clues to the other diners what its content is, we will give more emotion to the aperitif.
Caviaroli – Encapsulated Extra Virgin Olive Oil – 50 g
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Images | iStock – Radobera
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