Potato Salad

This is my family's recipe for potato salad. We had a big group over for 4th of July, and it was basically demanded that my mom make it. :D This recipe makes a ton of potato salad, but you can scale it back. The dressing part is mostly all down to your personal taste, anyway!

I don't even like mayo based potato salad, but I know this recipe is a keeper because generations of Blaggs/Ellenbergers/Mayziks have finished off hundreds of pounds of it. 

I know, I know - you're probably going "Why are there eggs on top of that potato salad?" TRADITION, THAT'S WHY. Do it cause that's what your grandmother would want. It is my opinion that all mayo based foods should look like they came out of a 1950s cookbook.

The solid ingredients:

• 10 pounds russet/Idaho potatoes, boiled with the skins on, peeled and chopped
• 1 onion, finely diced
• 1 1/2 green pepper, finely diced
• 1 stalk celery, finely diced
• 3 hard boiled eggs, peeled and sliced for garnish on top
• 1/4 cup or so sweet pickles (bread & butter style) finely diced

The sauce ingredients:

• 3 cups of mayo (no miracle whip allowed!)
• 2 tablespoons pickle juice
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon of mustard (mom uses spicy hot brown mustard)
• 2 pinches of smoked paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 chopped eggs

Method:

1. Boil all the potatoes you can find. Do this with skins on, and let them cool before peeling and chopping.
2. Hard boil the eggs.
3. Dice up the onion, green pepper, celery and pickles.
4. Make the sauce by mixing all the ingredients in a bowl - use a whisk to break the egg up and make everything nice and fluid. You're looking for a salad dressing consistency - or a little thinner!
5. Taste the dressing and alter as needed.
6. Pour the dressing over the potatoes - not all at once, because you don't want the mix to be too wet. Keep adding dressing and mixing until it's to your liking.
7. Top with sliced hard boiled eggs and sprinkles of paprika.
8. Serve to a hungry crowd and crown yourself "Lord of Potato Salad"