To all my friends and readers in the U.S. and Canada, here’s hoping you have a happy and safe Labor Day. Or as we like to say above the 49th Parallel, happy Labour Day!
In honor of the last big summer holiday of the year – and all the cookouts this weekend – here’s a great recipe for old-fashioned macaroni salad, care of my mother.
FLORA’S MACARONI SALAD
This salad has a secret ingredient – juice from the olive jar! Don’t skip this step. The salad won’t taste right without it.
- 4 cups cooked macaroni (Flora used elbow macaroni for this recipe)
- 1/3 cup finely chopped green olives stuffed with pimento (if you really like olives, feel free to add more. And buy good olives)
- 1 cup mayo (plus extra, to finish)
- 1/3 cup finely chopped onion (optional)
- Juice from the olive jar
- 2tsp good vinegar
- Salt and pepper to taste
Mix together the olives, the mayo, the onion, and the vinegar. Carefully pour juice from the olive jar into the mayo mixture, enough to thin it into a dressing that will coat the macaroni – without being too thick (not too precise, but that’s how Flora did it). If the dressing is too thin, add a little more mayo. Add salt and pepper to taste. Pour the dressing over the macaroni and mix carefully. Refrigerate for several hours before serving. After several hours, the macaroni will have absorbed a lot of the dressing. You can thin a bit more mayo with olive juice, and mix it in the salad to moisten it up before serving.