Potato Salad

Great with: Grilled rib-eye steak.

If you're making your vinaigrette with white-wine vinegar, use 1/2 teaspoon sugar (instead of 1/4 teaspoon) to balance the higher acidity.

Editor's note: This recipe is from Brini Maxwell's Guide to Gracious Living. For Maxwell's tips on throwing a summer pool party, click here. What family reunion would be complete without potato salad? This is my mother's recipe. It's delicious — tasty and tangy, just as potato salad should be.

A dish from the Pays de Caux region in northern France, where it is called salade Cauchoise. The salad is traditionally bound with crème fraîche, but it is delicious made with mayonnaise, too. Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

A tangy, refreshing take on summer's classic back-yard side dish.

Potato salad with a southwestern kick‑the perfect partner for grilled flank steak, chicken or red snapper seasoned with cumin.

Try adding a pound of crabmeat to this salad to turn it into an elegant main course.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Farmers' markets offer the widest selection of fresh baby potatoes, but if you can't find golf-ball-size versions of any of the varieties in this recipe, simply purchase large potatoes and cut them into 1 1/2-inch pieces.

Two favorite spring salads get combined into one easy, lower-fat version.

Have some carrot sticks, sweet gherkin pickles and buttered dinner rolls with the salad; if the picnic is taking place in the back yard, offer some corn on the cob as well. Oversize oatmeal cookies and watermelon wedges are a great finish. Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Drizzling sweet pickle juice over the warm potatoes is the secret to this delicious salad.

This is great warm or at room temperature.

Active time: 20 min Start to finish: 45 min