This easy recipe for crispy chimichurri potato salad swaps out the mayo for a tangy, spicy herb dressing and crisps up the potatoes for a jazzy new take on this favorite veggie side dish.

I will admit right here for the record that I am not the biggest fan of traditional potato salad. I have various and sundry potato salad recipes on this site that I do like a whole lot (I‘m looking at YOU, Boursin cheese potato salad) but pretty much all of them I wrote in an effort to find an alternative to the two most common versions, the mayonnaise version and the vinegar version.

Not that there is anything wrong with those – every person is 100% entitled to their potato salad faves – but I’m going to keep throwing potato salad curveballs at you, and here’s my latest.

Sliced potatoes that are fried up until they are crispy, dressed with a spicy tangy chimichurri sauce. Hello, my new potato salad buddy.

What the heck is chimichurri sauce, anyway?

I first discovered the wonder that is chimichurri sauce way back when I made it as a steak topping. It is a super easy, super flavorful blend of parsley, garlic, vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper that you whirl up in about ten seconds in your food processor.

The olive oil blends with the chopped parsley and garlic to make a thick, aromatic sauce that is all kinds of wonderful. And one day it dawned on me that if it could liven up steak, imagine what it could do for the humble potato!

The only hesitation I had was the possibility that this sassy sauce would overwhelm the poor little potatoes.

So I started looking around for inspiration, and found that some smart people were making potato salad with roasted and fried potatoes, which gave them a delectable little crusty crunchy exterior, and that’s when I knew that everything was going to be okay.

Crispy potato salad with chimichurri sauce was GOING TO HAPPEN.

Here’s how you make crispy chimichurri potato salad!

Start by boiling up some potatoes – I use medium sized Yukon Gold potatoes for this recipe, and I cook them until they are just tender and then pop them in a bowl of ice water while I make the sauce.

As I mentioned earlier, the sauce could not be simpler – just toss some parsley, garlic, vinegar, salt and pepper into your food processor and press go. Once everything is nice and chopped, slowly pour in some olive oil until you have a nice thick sauce and voila! You have made chimichurri.

When the potatoes are cool enough to handle, dry them off and slice them into 1/4 inch rounds. Heat up a little more olive oil in a skillet and brown them on both sides until they are golden and crispy.

Now all that’s left to do is to introduce the potatoes to the sauce.

I mean, is that a match made in heaven or what? And it’s a potato salad that I can get 100% behind!