Ingredients for the Haddock Potato Salad
Serves 6. Preparation time: 20 minutes. Cooking time: 20 minutes.
- 1 kg potatoes
- 2 carrots
- 6 small red pearl onions
- 250 g haddock
- 150 ml cider vinegar
- 100 ml white wine
- 300 ml rapeseed oil
- 60 g fresh salted sea lettuce (laitue de mer)
- Fleur de sel
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Steps — from warm potatoes to plating
- Cook the whole potatoes for about 20 minutes, or until a knife slides in easily. While still hot, peel them, cut into wedges and immediately drizzle with white wine. Cover with plastic wrap so they cool slightly while absorbing the wine; they take on the flavor best when warm.
- Meanwhile, slice the carrots into very thin rounds (about 2 mm). Blanch them for a few seconds in barely simmering salted water, then shock them in an ice bath to lock in color and crunch.
- Finely chop the small red onions. Remove the skin from the haddock and slice it into thin strips.
- Whisk a bright vinaigrette from the rapeseed oil, cider vinegar, salt and pepper. Toss the warm wine-scented potatoes with the carrots and some rinsed, finely chopped sea lettuce, then taste and adjust seasoning.
- Arrange the salad on a large serving platter, lay the haddock and onions on top, scatter the remaining sea lettuce and finish with a pinch of fleur de sel.
Why dress warm potatoes with white wine
The moment you remove potatoes from the water matters. A still-warm potato is porous and soaks up white wine like a sponge, allowing the flavor to penetrate to the center. If the potatoes were cold, the wine would remain mostly on the surface. Covering them briefly keeps them warm as they absorb the wine and helps retain a tender texture.
The carrots are blanched only briefly and then shocked in ice water to preserve their vivid color and crispness; that contrast complements the soft potatoes. The sea lettuce adds a saline, oceanic note that echoes the smoked haddock. This interplay of warm and cool, land and sea, gives the salad depth and brightness that a mayonnaise-based version lacks.