Pamela Anderson's Potato Salad Is Sunshine in a Bowl

Featured in her refreshingly cottagecore cookbook, I Love You: Recipes from the Heart, Pamela Anderson's Herby French Potato Salad (yes, that Pamela Anderson) features a heap of fresh herbs folded into creamy, plant-based mayo dressing that's spiked with Dijon. It feels like sunshine in a bowl. Just chop, mix, and chill—because everything's better when you can make it ahead!

I'm not 100% on this, but I'm pretty sure my blood type is Potato+. I remember many cozy winter meals at my grandparents' house in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, consisting of soft, sweet, and buttery potato dinner rolls, whole milk in a wine glass because we were mingling at the adults' table, and roasty-toasty, low-and-slow, oven-baked potatoes topped with melted butter and salt.

We carefully pinched the potatoes open, gently steaming our faces with that unmistakably comforting tropical tuber breeze. Leaving no potato untouched, we slathered butter onto the crispy skins once we'd devoured the fluffy insides.

Now that I'm the one doing all the potato cooking, I'm always looking for tips on taking a timeless picnic salad recipe over the top (like using America's Test Kitchen's salt-brined potato prepping technique). Pam's vegan recipe harvests a small springtime garden plot and puts it directly on your plate with rich, creamy carbs. (That's why we're here, amiright?) If there's one food that truly says "I love you," it's gotta be potatoes.

Why I Love Pamela Anderson's Herby Potato Salad

If you also love a dressing with enough Dijon mustard to pinball off your taste buds and low-key make your eyes water as you toss it into your spuds, this is your kind of potato salad. While all those bright green herbs are totally screaming "spring awakening," it's also pickle-y and tangy.

I'm dying to make it for every single summer cookout—I'm just waiting for the backyard barbecue invites to start rolling in. And when they do, this recipe will work with the vegan crowd, too, since it uses plant-based mayo.

In total bummer news, tarragon eluded me. It was sold out everywhere in LA, along with anything remotely close to it. (Is everyone making Pam's salad right now?) Great substitutes for the anise-like tarragon could be fresh chervil, fennel fronds, or Thai basil.

Quick Tips

• I suggest going by the weight, not the count, of the red potatoes listed in the recipe, because "8 small red potatoes" was like 17 million less than the number I needed to hit 2 3/4 pounds. Same with the pickles. Also, no need to be too precise—potato salad's a lover, not a fighter.
• Salt [clap] your [clap] potato [clap] water [clap]. There's a bit of salt in the dressing, but I think there's some wiggle room here for extra seasoning. Salt freely, to taste. 
• It's beyond tempting to dive right in, but let your salad rest in the fridge before you serve it. All those flavors—and that little bit of zhuzhed-up fat—get all buddy-buddy after a good 30-ish minutes, and the dish tastes even better.