German "Tater Tot" Potato Salad - Food Wishes

[Music] hello this is chef john from foodwishes.com with german tater tot potato salad that's right believe it or not we're making german potato salad with tater tots which was not only delicious and possibly texturally superior but we don't have to peel or slice any potatoes which makes an already pretty easy recipe even easier so i really did love everything about this and really the only downside is that we may upset a few germans but you know what that is a risk i'm willing to take so with that let's go ahead and get started by prepping our pan for our tots which means covering a sheet pan with foil and then spraying it or rubbing it generously with some vegetable oil at which point we'll transfer on one standard frozen bag of tater tots and we'll go ahead and spread those out as uniformly and evenly as possible and by the way when choosing your tots i usually go for the brands that have the fewest ingredients on the label okay potato salt and oil is pretty much all we want in there and then once those have been panned up we'll spray the top with some oil before transferring these into the center of a 425 degree oven for about 10 to 15 minutes longer than the package directions since the key to success here is a very very crisp very well done tater tots and that's it while those are in the oven we'll go ahead and make our hot bacon dressing which not surprisingly starts by adding some sliced bacon to a cold dry pan and then turning the heat up to medium high and what we'll do while that comes up to temperature is sort of break it up with a spoon or spatula and what we want to happen here is that our pieces of bacon cook until the fats totally rendered out and they are almost crispy and as you may already know there's a great visual clue for when that's about to happen which we've made into an easy to remember rhyme and that is when your bacon looks foamy it's almost done homie okay so when your bacon looks like this that means almost all that fat has been rendered out and you're very close to 100 crispification and what we'll do once we reach this point is lower our heat to medium and we will toss in our diced onion and we will cook that stirring occasionally for a few minutes in that bacon fat until it just starts to soften and sweeten up and turn translucent and please note we did not drain any of that bacon fat from the pan first and that's because that fat is going to actually act as the oil in our dressing so basically what we're doing here is a hot vinaigrette except instead of whisking some vegetable oil or olive oil into some vinegar we are going to be stirring some vinegar into this hot bacon grease to create what i consider the best hot dressing ever invented so like i said we'll cook those onions for a few minutes until they look something like this at which point we'll stop and toss in a couple tablespoons of sugar some freshly ground black pepper and of course a nice big pinch of salt and what we'll do is stir that in and then still on medium heat we'll cook that for about one minute or until that sugar just starts to caramelize onto the bottom of the pan but be careful we don't want to go too far since we don't want that to get too dark and give our dressing like a burnt sugar flavor so about one minute should be fine at which point we're going to deglaze the pan with some apple cider vinegar and we will go ahead and stir that in scraping the bottom of the pan as we do and in case you're new around here all deglaze means is adding some liquid to a pan which releases all that cooked on goodness on the bottom which dissolves into the liquid and not only does that add a tremendous amount of flavor but now we don't have to scrub our pan when we clean it so that is what we call in the business a win-win and that's it as soon as our pan's been deglazed we'll go ahead and turn off the heat since we really don't want this to reduce and at this point our hot bacon dressing is ready to use which is perfect since by now our tater tots should be done and by done we mean very well done and hopefully very very crispy and here's what mine sounded like as tested with a fork since as you know fork don't lie but another test these tots should pass is the old drop test okay if we drop a tot drop it like it's hot it should bounce and not break okay if it lands and just sticks there it's not cooked enough okay we really do need these tops to be extra extra crispy and well done and there's no way i could tell you exactly how much extra time that means in the oven so you got to figure that out i mean you guys are after all the bots of your tots but i'm going to say it's going to be at least 10 or 15 minutes longer than the cooking directions on the package and then what we'll do is let these cool for about five minutes or so before we transfer them to a large mixing bowl at which point we'll pour over our still warm bacon dressing and then we'll take a big spoon or spatula and toss these until they are thoroughly and evenly coated and because of that texture on the surface of our tots which features all kinds of tiny nooks and crannies it is really going to soak in this dressing beautifully and after a minute or two of tossing you're going to be wondering where it all went but don't worry there's plenty and even though most of it's going to soak in there's going to be no shortage of bacon dressing goodness and then what we'll do after thoroughly tossing our tots i think we should finish these off by mixing in a little freshly chopped herb which in my case is some italian parsley and some chives and besides possibly mixing some of that in you should probably give this a taste for salt although it's probably going to be okay since generally those tots come fully seasoned and then once we're happy with how everything's looking and tasting we can go ahead and serve that up scattering those beautiful bacon bits over the top which reminds me remember when every salad bar had that bowl of bacon bits near the dressings did we ever find out what that stuff was made of i'm not sure but i know it wasn't bacon but anyway that's it once garnished our german tater tot potato salad is ready to enjoy and if you're a fan of the tater tots which i assume you are since you're still watching i believe you'll find the salad to be spectacular and taste texture and appearance and other than the fact that we're not using just boiled sliced potatoes this really is like the classic german potato salad in every way except here we're enjoying the extra bonus of crispy crunchy fried potatoes so as you've probably gathered i'm a huge fan of this alternative version although having said that if you're not a fan of the potato tots or god forbid potatoes in general you should still absolutely make this dressing and you can use it to make a beautiful warm spinach salad or spoon it over a chicken breast or pork chop or and you did not hear this for me you could actually serve it over vanilla ice cream like hot fudge and no that's not a joke oh and as good as these were just eating them right out of the bowl i did eventually serve some up next to some beautiful barbecued roast beef on a bun which yes is gonna appear in an upcoming video so please stay tuned for that but in the meantime i really do hope you give this a try soon so please follow the links below for the ingredient amounts a printable written recipe and much more info as usual and as always enjoy you

Channel: Food Wishes

Views: 217,645

Rating: 4.9316359 out of 5

Keywords: German, Potato, Salad, Tater, Tot, side, dish, recipe, fast, easy, chef, john, food, wishes, cooking, summer, picnic

Id: nD7acxhmiMo

Length: 7min 20sec (440 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 16 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/PM_ME_UR_DIET_TIPS]

Tons of trolls swarming the youtube comments.

[u/St_SiRUS]

Cool idea for a super easy and delicious side dish. I’d personally add a bit of extra greenery

[u/sneeeekysnek]

I love chef John. I've cooked so many of his recipes and not one I didn't like

[u/Sadams90]

I’m sorry…serve this over vanilla ice cream? Am I losing it or did I hear that right

[u/skrahen]

how long before this gets soggy? asking because if it transports well it will be my next pot luck. thanks in advance.

[u/mistermajik2000]

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/285015/german-tater-tot-potato-salad/