This simple dish uses lightly smoked potatoes to add a whole new twist on a classic family favorite. It only takes a few minutes to smoke the potatoes.
Heat up the grill to 350°F. Normally when smoking, I would keep the temperature at 225°F, but I am raising it to make the smoking process faster as the potatoes become quite infused with the smoke in just 40-50 minutes.
Note: For electric and pellet smokers, you can smoke the potatoes at a lower temperature (275-300°F). I smoked them on the Big Green Egg, which is a charcoal grill/smoker. For this type of smoker, the coals also contribute to the smoky flavor, so a shorter cooking time is needed.
Toss the potatoes with olive oil, salt and pepper in a gallon Ziploc Bag. You will get even coverage by shaking them in a bag. Just dump it all in, shake it a little and the potatoes will be perfectly coated and ready to go.
Pour the potatoes into an aluminum disposable pan. Alternatively, you can use a reusable vegetable basket. We want to show there are many ways to reach the finish line here! You can also pull out the Beer Can Chicken basket as it can hold about ¾ of the potatoes from this recipe. Smoke the potatoes for 40-50 minutes or until fork tender. Bring the potatoes in and allow to cool.
Make the Smoked Potato Salad
After the potatoes are cool, cut them in half.
Mix them with the mayonnaise, sour cream, chopped bacon, cheese, apple cider vinegar and chives. I would not salt or pepper the mixture until you taste test it as the potatoes already have salt and pepper on them.
Serve and enjoy! Like all other potato salad recipes, it is best if you can refrigerate it for a couple hours prior to serving to allow to have ingredients meld together.
Notes
Substitutions: You can substitute the mayonnaise and sour cream with Greek Yogurt. Use turkey bacon in place of regular bacon. Use any baby potato. Taste: This is going to taste like a loaded bake potato, if you want to steer from that and make it more of a traditional potato salad, remove the bacon and cheese. Then add in eggs and a little mustard. Storage: This recipe doesn’t make a huge batch, so I doubt there will be much leftover. If there is, one day in the refrigerator is going to be enough. On the second and third days, the smoke flavor kept becoming more powerful, and it just wasn’t as good as the first or second days. Hey, at least I’m honest here!