Great-Grandma Engelmann's German Potato Salad

I modified my great-grandmother's recipe for my sister last week. We had Hungarian sausage that she used to make, and I made this side dish. Grandma used to slice the potatoes, but I like them a very semi-mashed consistency.

Wash half of a small bag of red potatoes. Halve or quarter them to make them all uniform size for boiling so they'll all get done at the same rate. Boil them over medium high heat in enough water to cover them, with a healthy dash of sea salt. This will season the potatoes as they boil. Meanwhile, cook half a pound of bacon until crispy and drain the bacon on a paper towel. Reserve half the bacon fat.

Drain the potatoes when they are fork tender, reserving 3 tablespoons of the potato water. Dice a medium onion and sautee it until tender in the bacon fat. Then add the potato water into the bacon fat and onions. Also add 1/4 c white wine vinegar into the bacon fat, heat and mix together gently with a little black pepper and authentic Hungarian paprika.

Gently mash the potatoes, only sightly mashing them so that there are large pieces and some small pieces. Or, if you prefer...slice them, but that's a pain and takes longer, in my opinion, to achieve the same tasting dish. Add the bacon dripping and onion mixture to the potatoes and then garnish with a heavy handful of chives or parsley. I made this one with fresh chives. Don't forget to add the the bacon back in, crumbled up into small pieces.

Serve hot or cold, but Grandma always served it hot. It was tastier than I remember hers, but then I was a kid and hated vinegary tasting foods with gooey textures. Now? Potatoes, bacon, onions and chives in bacon drippings? It's the bomb!