Olivier Salad - Russian Potato Salad with Tuna, eggs, onions, pickles, cucumbers, corn, green peas, and fresh dill.
What is Olivier Salad?
Olivier Salad is a traditional Russian potato salad made with cooked potatoes, cooked carrots, eggs, pickles, green peas, diced ham or chicken. The mayo combined with mustard is usually used as a salad dressing.
My version of Olivier salad uses tuna instead of ham or chicken. The addition of ingredients like cucumber, dill and tuna makes this salad exceptionally fresh! And, all the flavors work really well together! This salad keeps well refrigerated for several days and only gets better the next day, as all the ingredients mingle together into a real comfort food!
Make sure that all the ingredients are finely chopped. That way, you can get EVERYTHING (potatoes, eggs, peas, cucumber, pickles, carrots, corn) - in ONE BITE!
Cook's tips:
- If you like your potato salad to have more “bang” to it, try adding more finely chopped pickles after you mixed everything.
- When adding mayo to the salad, you can use smaller amount of mayo than the recipe calls for as the salad gets moister as it sits.
- This salad is a great way to use any leftover cooked meat: chicken, turkey, beef, ham is a popular choice. Or, omit meat altogether to make it vegetarian!
A little history about Olivier Potato Salad
This potato salad is one of the most famous Russian recipes, also known as Olivier salad. The salad was actually created by a very popular Belgian chef with the last name of Olivier for his upscale and super popular Moscow restaurant in the late 1800’s. Chef Olivier would create everything for this salad from scratch, including mayo (I’m pretty sure you couldn’t buy store-bought mayo back then :)). I have to credit my friend for giving me an idea to use tuna in this salad - it's really good here and a lighter version of a regular Olivier salad. Enjoy!
Olivier Salad - Russian Potato Salad with Tuna
Ingredients
- 4 potatoes , boiled and peeled
- 2 carrots , boiled and peeled
- 4 eggs , hard-boiled, peeled
- ½ onion
- 3 pickles
- 2 cucumbers
- 8 oz yellow corn , from the can
- ½ lb canned tuna
- 12 oz peas , frozen
- ½ cup mayo
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1 tablespoon fresh dill finely chopped
Instructions
- Finely dice potatoes, carrots, eggs, onion, pickles, cucumbers into very small cubes.
- Cook frozen peas in boiling water, according to package instructions. (should take you just a couple of minutes) – drain of all water and pat dry.
- Shred tuna finely or dice it finely.
- Combine all these ingredients, including yellow corn, in a large bowl, add mayo and mix to combine, carefully stirring the salad so that the ingredients are evenly coated, and making sure that all ingredients stay whole.
- Do not add all of mayo at once – add as much as you need. Season with salt and pepper, dill. Keep in mind that the salad get moister as it sits – another good reason not to add too much mayo but just enough to coat the ingredients. The salad gets even better the next day.
Nutrition
Nutrition Disclaimer:
The nutritional information on this website is only an estimate and is provided for convenience and as a courtesy only. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed. It should not be used as a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
Are they dill pickles?
Yes, you can use dill pickles.
This looks like a great salad.
To me it does not matter where it originated from, but the fact that it is a healthy bite!
Hello Julia,
I find it interesting that you say this salad originates in Russia. Though it's called Russian Salad in Spain, the facts are that: potatoes were brought back to Europe from South America by the Spaniards, Mayonnaise is from the town of Mayon also in Spain, peppers green, red, paprika etc were also brought back to Europe by the Spaniards whom also have a high culinary expertise. Neither do you find any members of the Tuna family in Russian waters. Digging into the historic background of this recipe, you will actually find that it comes from the Basque Country of Spain. My family is a Basque on both sides with Italian and French. The information you presented though nice is indeed historically, culturally and geographically incorrect. My apologies if I have upset or embarrassed you. Not my intention, only the facts.
Kindest regards
You, sir, are incorrect! Russian salad indeed originated in Russia! The origin of the ingredients is meaningless as to the origin of the recipe. You are embarrassing yourself. Now a quick Google search shows:
"Russian Salad (Ensalada Rusa) was originally invented by Lucien Olivier for a Moscow restaurant called Hermitage in 1860s. It became very popular in Russia and can now be found in any restaurant across the country. It’s traditionally served on any Holiday, gatherings, birthday parties etc… The local variations can be found in almost any Eastern European Country from Ukraine, Bulgaria to Poland and Hungary."
https://eatingeuropean.com/russian-salad-olivier-salad/
Hi julia i like yr potatoe salad with tuna I wil try and make it,
Hi Julia!
This salad sounds delicious and I am planning to make it very soon. How long did you boil the potatoes (until fork-tender?) and more importantly, the carrots? Also, did you boil both whole and with the skins on, then peeled and chopped after? Thanks!
Allison
Allison, I boil the potatoes until fork-tender. I prefer lower starch, waxy potatoes for salads (not Russet potatoes). I cook carrots until very tender, as well. I boil potatoes with skins on and peel them after they cool off a little bit, and I boil carrots with skins off and then just chop them. 🙂
I love a good potato salad and yours looks devine! I love how you added tuna to it. Makes me feel like summer is right around the corner. 🙂
Dear Julia, love the salad, of course, the best salad in a world-))) In St. Petersburg very often we used chicken in a salad and was "Stolichney Salad".
Hugs,
Yelena
How interesting, Yelena. I was just reading about the history of olivier salad and it mentioned that "Stolinchney Salad" was a "simpler" version of an original Olivier salad. Of course, all homemade versions of Olivier are pretty simple! 🙂 Just a lot of dicing! 🙂
Such a refreshing salad after the Holidays. And so colorful for a potato salad!