Salads & Sides

I don’t know what it is about this dish, but it always brings me back to the screen door slamming behind me and the smell of bacon drifting out of the kitchen before I even hit the porch steps. My mom only made warm German potato salad a few times a year — always when we had family visiting, always in her biggest enamel pan, and always always with a wooden spoon (never metal, she swore it made the potatoes taste tinny). It wasn’t picnic food. It was real food. You served it warm, straight out of the skillet, and …

I’m gonna be honest with you — this salad wasn’t born out of careful planning or some deep love of Vietnamese cuisine (though I do love it). It came from a half-used package of ground pork, a drawer full of cabbage that was hanging on by a thread, and one of those evenings where I stood in the kitchen, hands on hips, muttering, “What on earth is for dinner?” We’ve all been there, right? Well. What started as a bit of a fridge clean-out turned into something I now crave. This Vietnamese Meatball Salad is one of those magical meals …

The cold side dish that disappears first at every potluck. Always has. Always will. This one takes me back. There’s something about pea salad that just lives in my memory — right next to paper plates on picnic tables, pastel Tupperware bowls, and plastic serving spoons that somehow never made it back home. You know what I mean? My mama used to make this every summer. No matter what else was on the table — fried chicken, deviled eggs, seven-layer dip — the pea salad bowl was the first to be scraped clean. It didn’t matter how much she made. …

Let me tell you, I was raised in a kitchen where Sunday meant two things: the smell of garlic hitting hot olive oil by 10 a.m., and someone yelling, “Did you remember the provolone?” before noon. Cold salads? Those were usually pasta-based, maybe with a little cucumber tossed in for crunch. But broccoli? In an Italian salad? I would’ve given you that look — you know, the one that says, “Are you sure Nonna would approve?” Well, as it turns out, she probably would’ve gone back for seconds. This Italian Broccoli Salad takes all the bold, briny, meaty goodness of …

There’s something about cheesy potato casserole that just… feels like home, doesn’t it? I can’t even count how many times I’ve made this dish — holidays, Sunday suppers, potlucks, “just because it’s Tuesday” nights. And you know what? It never, ever lasts long. Someone’s always scraping the corners of the dish, trying to sneak “just one more spoonful.” My mom used to make something like this — creamy, cheesy, bubbling over the edges of her old Pyrex dish. It was the kind of recipe she didn’t even need to write down. And now? It’s one of those comfort dishes I …

Okay, I’ll be honest — lunch has always been a bit of a blur for me. Especially during the week. I’m either juggling a dozen tabs open on my laptop, trying to remember if I already reheated the same sad leftovers… or just skipping it altogether because I forgot (again). But this salad? This Mandarin Quinoa Crunch changed everything. It’s the kind of meal you can throw together in a big bowl, stick in the fridge, and feel downright smug about for days. Bright citrus, nutty crunch, a little sweet, a little savory — it’s one of those rare dishes …

You know how every summer barbecue has that table — the one with the cold salads, big bowls of pasta, and a plate of deviled eggs disappearing faster than the burgers? That’s basically my childhood. There was always somebody’s “famous” pasta salad and someone else’s “you have to try them” deviled eggs. And one day, I thought… why not just put them together? That’s how this “Eggcellent Pasta Delight” happened. Honestly, it’s just deviled egg flavors and pasta hanging out in the same bowl, and somehow it tastes like it’s always been a thing. Creamy, tangy, a little nostalgic. Why …

Seafood wasn’t a regular guest at our table growing up in the Midwest. We were more of a meatloaf and mashed potatoes family. But every once in a while, Mama would surprise us — a little shrimp cocktail at Christmas, maybe a can of crab meat mixed into something “fancy” for Sunday lunch. And just like that, our dining room felt like it had drifted a few hundred miles closer to the ocean. This salad? It scratches that same itch for me now, only without the wait for a holiday. It’s creamy, a little briny, and has that Old Bay …

I’m gonna be honest with you—this salad isn’t fancy. It won’t win any Michelin stars. Heck, it barely qualifies as a “salad” if you ask the lettuce purists. But you know what? It’s the first thing gone at every cookout. I first tasted this little bowl of joy at a Fourth of July potluck years ago. My friend Karen brought it in a big ol’ Tupperware and said, “Try this, you’ll thank me later.” I did. I did thank her. Then I asked for the recipe, made it the next weekend, and now it’s in my regular summer rotation like …

The one side dish I didn’t expect to love this much, but now I can’t live without. I’ll be real with you: I wasn’t planning on impressing anyone when I made this the first time. It was the day before Thanksgiving, I was already knee-deep in pie crusts and to-do lists, and I had two bags of frozen spinach in the freezer that had been sitting there since… well, let’s just say they’d been there a while. I was tired, the dog was barking at nothing, and my kitchen timer had just broken. But I needed a green veggie dish. …