🥔 SIDE
Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad)
Waxy potatoes sliced while warm and soaked in a dressing of hot beef broth, vinegar, oil, mustard and onion until glossy and slightly creamy, served lukewarm with chives beside a Wiener Schnitzel.
Austrian · easy · serves 4
prep 20 min · cook 25 min · plus 1 h hands-off time
~366 cal · 6g protein · 46g carbs · 17g fat · 6g fiber · 4g sugars · 2g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Erdäpfelsalat, from Erdäpfel, the Austrian word for potatoes, is the side that goes with a Wiener Schnitzel, and there is hardly a Viennese Beisl, the city's old-fashioned taverns, that does not serve it. It has no mayonnaise. Its creaminess comes from the potatoes themselves: they are sliced while still warm and soaked in a marinade of warm beef broth, vinegar and oil, and the starch from the slices thickens the dressing as they sit.
Viennese cooks favour Kipfler, a small, long, waxy potato, and a mild vinegar; many add a spoon of mustard and some a pinch of sugar, which only became common after the Second World War. Finely chopped onion goes into the dressing, and the salad is finished with chives and very thin onion rings.
One rule is kept above all others: the salad is served lukewarm or at room temperature, never cold from the fridge, which dulls it.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally dairy-, nut-, egg- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 4
- 1 kg waxy potatoes, ideally Kipfler, all about the same size
- 250 ml beef (Rindsuppe), hot, homemade or from a cube; many stock cubes contain wheat
- 3 tbsp mild white wine vinegar
- 5 tbsp sunflower or rapeseed oil
- 1 tsp medium or tarragon mustard
- 1 red onion, very finely chopped, plus a few paper-thin rings to finish
- 1 pinch sugar, optional
- 1 tsp salt
- to taste black pepper
- 3 tbsp chives, snipped
Instructions
- 1Boil the potatoes in their skins in salted water for 20 to 25 minutes, until just tender all the way through. Drain.
- 2While they cook, whisk the hot stock with the vinegar, mustard, chopped onion, salt, pepper and the sugar if using. Keep it warm.
- 3Peel the potatoes while they are still hot (hold them on a fork) and slice them about 3 mm thick straight into a wide bowl.
- 4Pour the warm broth dressing over the warm slices and turn them gently. Leave for 10 minutes, then add the oil and turn again.✎ Chef’s noteAdding the broth and vinegar before the oil lets the potatoes soak up the dressing; oil first would coat them and keep it out.
- 5Leave the salad to stand for about 1 hour at room temperature, turning once or twice, until the slices are glossy and the dressing has turned slightly creamy. Taste for salt and vinegar.
- 6Scatter with chives and thin onion rings and serve lukewarm with Wiener Schnitzel or other fried or roast meat.
Viennese tavern tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Vienna. Pastry here is a trade with its own vocabulary. Strudel dough is stretched by hand until print can be read through it, the coffee list is a set of ratios rather than flavours, and the question of who could call their Sachertorte the original went through the Austrian courts for the best part of thirty years.
🗺️
Austria. Viennese cooking is an inventory of an empire. Goulash came from Hungary, Buchteln and Powidl from the Czech lands, Palatschinken are claimed by the Romanians, and the whole assembly acquired the name Wiener Kuche in German cookbooks around the end of the eighteenth century. What Vienna added was the technique and the presentation rather than the dishes.
🌍
Europe. Europe has written a great deal of its food into law. A regulation of 1992 created the protected designation of origin and the protected geographical indication, tying a name to a place and a method, and an EU evaluation published in 2021 counted more than three thousand registered names across those schemes, from cheeses and hams down to particular shapes of bread.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Austria
Wiener SchnitzelVienna’s golden icon: a thin cutlet in a puffed, wavy breadcrumb crust, fried in butter and finished with lemon.
Wiener FrühstückA Viennese breakfast of a crusty Kaisersemmel, soft-boiled egg, butter, jam, and a milky Melange.
FrittatensuppeClear beef broth poured over ribbons of sliced savory pancake, a classic Viennese starter and light lunch.
Browse all Austria recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Oven, Whisk.
Storing it: Best assembled just before serving. Prep the components ahead and dress at the last moment so it stays crisp.
Make it an Austria meal
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Cuisine
Diet
Frequently asked questions
What is Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad)?
Waxy potatoes sliced while warm and soaked in a dressing of hot beef broth, vinegar, oil, mustard and onion until glossy and slightly creamy, served lukewarm with chives beside a Wiener Schnitzel.
Where does Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad) come from?
Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad) is an Austrian dish from Vienna, Austria.
Can Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad) be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad) recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions. Treat the substitutions as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad) safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we still count coconut as a tree nut to be cautious, although the FDA stopped listing it as one in 2025), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Wiener Erdäpfelsalat (Viennese Potato Salad) take to make?
About 1 h 45 min in all: 20 minutes prep and 25 minutes cooking, plus 1 h of hands-off waiting the method needs, serving 4.
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