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Central Mexico's Christmas Eve potato salad, diced potato and carrot and peas folded into crema and mayonnaise with a little apple, the cold dish that anchors every cena navideña table from Ciudad de México to Querétaro.
This is a Christmas dish from Central Mexico. Ciudad de México, Estado de México, Puebla, Tlaxcala, Querétaro. The cena navideña table, December 24, sitting next to the bacalao a la vizcaína and the romeritos and the pavo. Every household has it. Every household swears their version is the right one.
The name comes from the Russian original, but the Mexican version stopped being Russian a long time ago. We do not use beets. We do not use pickles. We add apple. We use crema mexicana, which is tangier than sour cream and softer than crème fraîche. The salad is cool, creamy, slightly sweet, slightly tart, and it sits on the table cold next to dishes that have been simmering for hours. That contrast is the point.
The technique is simple but the discipline matters. Cut everything the same size. Boil the carrots and potatoes in separate pots so the carrot does not stain the potato pink. Do not shock the vegetables in cold water, that turns the salad watery within an hour. Let everything cool on a sheet pan and lose its steam before it meets the dressing. These are not optional steps. La cocina no es decoración, es trabajo.
My mother made this every Nochebuena. She kept a recipe on an index card that she had used so many times the corners were soft. She added a little fresh pineapple, which is a Central Mexican touch that some households do and some refuse. I do it. My aunt in Toluca refused. We argued about it for thirty years. Cada estado, su propia cocina, and within every state, every family fights about the details.
Ensalada rusa arrived in Mexico through the cosmopolitan dining rooms of Porfirian Ciudad de México in the late 19th century, when French chefs and European cookbooks shaped the menus of Mexican high society and the original Russian Olivier salad was adapted across Latin America and the Mediterranean. The dish migrated from the upper-class table to the working-class kitchen during the post-revolutionary period of the 1920s and 1930s, when canned peas and industrial mayonnaise became widely available in Mexican cities and the salad became affordable for ordinary families. By mid-20th century, ensalada rusa had been thoroughly criollized, with the Mexican additions of crema, apple, and sometimes pineapple distinguishing it from its European ancestor, and it had embedded itself in the Central Mexican Christmas Eve menu alongside other syncretic dishes like bacalao a la vizcaína and romeritos en mole.
Quantity
2 pounds
peeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice
Quantity
3 medium
peeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice
Quantity
1 cup
Quantity
2 tablespoons
Quantity
1 medium
peeled, cored, and cut into 1/4-inch dice
Quantity
1 tablespoon
Quantity
3/4 cup
Quantity
3/4 cup
Quantity
1 teaspoon, plus more to taste
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
Quantity
1/4 cup
finely diced
Quantity
1/2 cup
finely diced
Quantity
1/2 cup
Quantity
for lining the platter
Quantity
for serving
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Yukon Gold or papa alpha potatoespeeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice | 2 pounds |
| carrotspeeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice | 3 medium |
| fresh shelled peas, or frozen petit pois | 1 cup |
| kosher salt (for boiling water) | 2 tablespoons |
| Red Delicious or Gala applepeeled, cored, and cut into 1/4-inch dice | 1 medium |
| fresh lime juice | 1 tablespoon |
| Mexican crema (crema ácida) | 3/4 cup |
| mayonnaise, preferably McCormick or Hellmann's | 3/4 cup |
| kosher salt | 1 teaspoon, plus more to taste |
| freshly ground black pepper | 1/2 teaspoon |
| white onionfinely diced | 1/4 cup |
| fresh pineapple (optional)finely diced | 1/2 cup |
| raisins (optional) | 1/2 cup |
| leaf lettuce (optional) | for lining the platter |
| pickled jalapeños en escabeche (optional) | for serving |
Peel the potatoes and carrots. Cut both into 1/2-inch dice. The same size matters. If your potato is bigger than your carrot, one will be raw when the other is mush. Take the extra five minutes with the knife. This is the difference between a serious ensalada rusa and a sad one.
Bring two medium pots of water to a boil. Salt each one generously, about a tablespoon of salt per pot. Drop the carrots into one and the potatoes into the other. The carrots take about 8 minutes. The potatoes take about 10 to 12. You want them tender to a knife but with structure. Boil them together and the carrot dye stains the potato pink. Boil them past done and the salad becomes mashed potato with regrets.
When each is just tender, drain immediately and spread the dice on a sheet pan to cool. Do not run them under cold water. Water gets into the potato and makes the salad weep liquid later. Let them cool to room temperature on the pan, about 20 minutes. The steam should rise off, then settle. That is the moisture leaving.
Drop the peas into the same boiling water for 2 minutes if fresh, 1 minute if frozen. Drain and add them to the sheet pan with the potatoes and carrots. Peas have no patience. They go from sweet to chalky in a minute, so do not walk away.
Peel, core, and dice the apple into 1/4-inch pieces, smaller than the potato. Toss with the lime juice in a small bowl. The lime keeps the apple from browning and balances the sweetness against the crema. My mother used Red Delicious because that was what came to La Merced in December. Gala works. Granny Smith is too tart for this dish.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the crema and mayonnaise until smooth. Season with the teaspoon of salt and the black pepper. Taste it now. The dressing should taste a little more salted than seems right because the potatoes will absorb it. Crema mexicana is the soul of this salad. American sour cream is sharper and thinner. If you must substitute, thin sour cream with a tablespoon of half-and-half and a pinch of salt.
Add the cooled potatoes, carrots, peas, apple, and white onion to the dressing. If you are using pineapple or raisins, add them now. Fold gently with a rubber spatula. Do not stir aggressively. You want the dice to stay whole, not break into starch. The salad should look generous, with every piece coated but not drowning in dressing.
Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, ideally 4. The salad needs time for the flavors to settle and the dressing to tighten around the vegetables. Taste again before serving. It will need a final pinch of salt. Cold dulls salt, and the salad will read flat without it.
Line a serving platter with leaf lettuce. Mound the ensalada rusa generously over the lettuce. Serve cold, with pickled jalapeños on the side for those who want the bite. This is a side at the Christmas Eve cena, sitting alongside the bacalao, the romeritos, the pavo. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.
1 serving (about 215g)
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