I first saw the delightful mashup of golden brown smashed potatoes and potato salad dressing on my TikTok feed a couple of months ago and immediately bookmarked it. Since then, I’ve seen several others pop up on my For You page, and though it’s unclear where the trend originated — creators @ice.karimcooks and @dr.vegan appear to have been early promoters — it was Hungry Happens blogger Stella Drivas’s take on it that went viral. With more than 15.5 million views and nearly a million likes, her salad featuring ultrathin, crispy potatoes with a tangy, tzatziki-inspired dressing (Greek yogurt, garlic, herbs and cucumber) sent foodies on the app into a frenzy. Since her video in January, plenty more variations have popped up, including veganized versions and a genius rendition with tater tots.
I hopped on the bandwagon and initially tried the Hungry Happens recipe and one from Allrecipes, which amassed 4.5 million views on TikTok. The Allrecipes version from Nicole McLaughlin is a bit more pared down, with a dressing of sour cream, mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, lemon juice, dill, parsley and green onions. Since it’s similar to my usual potato salad, I anticipated preferring this version, but I found that the crispy texture of the potatoes needed a punchy dressing to stand up to it. That’s where the tzatziki flavors of the Hungry Happens recipe had the advantage.
While I thought it was delicious from the start, I decided to tinker with the original Hungry Happens recipe, pulling from my recipe tests as well as my own potato salad preferences. I strayed from my usual sour cream and opted for whole-milk Greek yogurt, which provides a tangy flavor with a touch of richness, and combined it with mayonnaise to create a creamy base.
Red onions replace shallots to keep with the Mediterranean theme, and a single clove of garlic has a small but mighty presence. Lemon and red wine vinegar add brightness, and while a number of herbs, such as parsley or mint, could work, I like my tzatziki to be dill-forward.
I was unsure how the cucumbers would fare in the salad, concerned that they might make the dish too watery, but when seeded and chopped into small pieces, they provide a cooling crunch that both balances and heightens the flavor and texture of the potatoes. The pickles are not a traditional tzatziki ingredient, but in my book, all good potato salads include them. They mingle with the zippy flavors of the onion, lemon and vinegar while still maintaining the refreshing bite of their raw counterparts.
The key to this salad, though, is the smashed potatoes. Boiling baby potatoes until they’re tender and easily pierced with a fork allows them to be smashed evenly and kept mostly intact. I also noticed smaller spuds were easier to smash. Some of the recipes involve smashing the potatoes so thin that they almost transform into chips, but I still wanted a hint of a fluffy interior and found that keeping them around 1/4- to 1/2-inch thick seemed to do the trick.
Yes, you might be eyeing the total cook time and oven instructions with skepticism, but the 55 minutes of roasting are necessary for a crisp, golden brown exterior on the potatoes. Plus, that downtime allows you to prep the dressing without having to worry about fussing with mise en place first. I promise, the result is worth it. If you’re worried about heating up your kitchen too much (a valid concern during a heat wave), you can also try air frying the potatoes at 400 degrees, or just cubing boiled potatoes and tossing them with the dressing.
While there is still a place in my heart for more traditional potato salads and standard smashed potatoes, the combination of the two is one that will be a staple in my summertime recipe repertoire. And when the great potato debate next arises, I have just the thing to contribute to the discussion.