Redeem now - I made egg-salad recipes from chefs Geoffrey Zakarian, Ina Garten, Rachael Ray, and Curtis Aikens.
- Ray's and Aikens' recipes were a little out of my comfort zone when it comes to the classic dish.
- Garten's simple recipe was my favorite, but I was also a big fan of Zakarian's egg salad.
Egg salad is a classic, simple recipe that makes great use of excess ingredients and cheap kitchen staples.
As a kid, I always looked forward to dyeing eggs for Easter, and afterward, we'd make a big batch of egg salad, so the dish is such a nostalgic comfort food.
I already have my own take on egg salad, but I decided to test recipes from four celebrity chefs — Geoffrey Zakarian, Ina Garten, Rachael Ray, and Curtis Aikens — to look for some new, exciting tricks to spice up the classic dish.
Read on to see how the recipes stacked up.
Zakarian's recipe looked a lot like my own, with a couple of twists
Zakarian's recipe called for pretty standard egg-salad ingredients with the welcome additions of chives, Dijon mustard, and sweet relish.
This was an incredibly quick recipe to throw together
Once the eggs were hard-boiled, this recipe came together in no time.
I chopped up the eggs and mixed them in a container with the mayo, Dijon mustard, fresh chives, relish, and salt and pepper. Then, I added a generous amount between two slices of bread.
I loved this recipe, but I'd cut down on the relish next time
This egg salad was just a little too sweet, which makes sense considering the recipe called for more relish than mustard.
Otherwise, it turned out great. It was a chunkier egg salad — which I'm a fan of — and the mustard-to-mayonnaise ratio was perfect. The chives really brightened up the otherwise heavy spread.
I'll definitely be trying this recipe again with about half of the relish.
Garten's egg-salad recipe is part of a larger smoked-salmon tartine dish
I didn't give her full smoked-salmon tartines a go, but I wanted to try out Garten's simple egg-salad recipe found within the larger dish.
I've tested many of Garten's recipes, so I wasn't surprised to see the inclusion of fresh herbs.
I love adding dill to egg salad, and she also swaps regular yellow mustard for whole grain, which I was excited to try.
This recipe was simple, and the directions for hard-boiling the eggs were perfect
It's not difficult to hard-boil eggs, but I found that Garten's simple instructions yielded perfect, nearly unblemished results. It was almost sad to have to smash them up into the salad.
I simply added the eggs to a pot, covered them with cold water, brought the water to a boil, and let the eggs simmer for five minutes. Then, I turned off the stove and let them sit for five more minutes. Finally, I drained the eggs and covered them in cold water.
When it came time to peel, I simply cracked and very lightly rolled the eggs against my wood cutting board.
The shells came off so easily that I ended up using this method for all of the eggs for the four recipes.
I'd add more dill next time, but otherwise, this was a winner
In addition to being quick to make, the resulting egg salad was also delicious.
It was pretty light on mayonnaise and mustard, so it had a stronger egg flavor, but that was fine with me. It also had an ideal amount of salt.
Because this egg salad was meant to pair with salmon, it doesn't have an overwhelming flavor on its own, so I'd add a lot more dill next time and maybe a little more mustard.
Ray's egg salad included potatoes and a long list of extra ingredients
This was certainly not one of Ray's famed 30-minute meals.
In fact, this potato-and-egg recipe took the longest to make, and it had the most complex ingredient list.
The process was long, but it was pretty easy to follow
I started by boiling my potatoes and pouring some vegetable stock in a small saucepan to gently warm it up on the stove.
Meanwhile, I mixed together the mustard, apple-cider vinegar, anchovy-free Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, and extra-virgin olive oil to make a dressing.
Next, I chopped the parsley, celery, and yellow chile pepper and combined them in a small bowl. Ray's recipe called for a red chile pepper, but my local grocery store only had yellow, so I improvised.
I cut the total recipe down to two servings and then reduced the amount of celery by half because I strongly dislike the taste of celery, and I didn't want it to sway my opinion of the final product.
Once the potatoes were soft, I put them in a bowl, cut them up, and poured some of the warm vegetable stock over them.
Next, I added the spices, the chile-celery-parsley mix, and the homemade dressing. Then, I added the chopped hard-boiled eggs and gave everything a final mix.
It tasted better than I expected, but it was more of a potato salad than an egg salad
With all the different flavors and the unappetizing look, I didn't expect to like this recipe. But it actually tasted pretty good.
It had a nice level of spice from the chile pepper, hot sauce, and paprika, and the dressing added a lot of umami flavor.
But I couldn't really taste the eggs. The texture and flavor both leaned more heavily toward the potatoes.
To me, egg salad is something to enjoy on bread or with crackers, and this would be way too heavy to serve like that. It was definitely its own side dish.
If I'm craving egg salad, I wouldn't make this again. However, I might try this again when I want potato salad.
Aikens' recipe called for a few unique ingredients
Aikens has a California egg-salad recipe with some standard and surprising ingredients, including olives, sweet relish, red bell pepper, and mayo.
As a transplant in California, I'd never had an egg salad like this, but I was intrigued by it.
This recipe was a breeze to put together
There's just one line of directions for this recipe: "Mix all ingredients together in a small mixing bowl."
Of course, I had to chop the bell pepper and olives and hard-boil the eggs, but this recipe really was as simple and straightforward as it looked.
The taste and texture were a little overwhelming
This egg salad was very crunchy from the relish and the peppers. I don't mind crunchy snacks, but this much crunch in an egg salad just isn't for me.
The flavor was OK, but there were too many competing notes, from the sweetness of the relish to the brininess of the olives, and they didn't really work together.
Based on this recipe, I'm inspired to add some olives to my regular egg salad. I love the flavor, and their softer texture works well. But I don't think they work when other strong flavors, like relish, are involved.
Garten's recipe was my favorite, but Zakarian's was a close second
With more dill, Garten's recipe would be perfect. I was also impressed with her no-fuss way of making perfect hard-boiled eggs.
Zakarian's recipe was a very close second, but next time I'd majorly reduce the amount of sweet relish.
Ray's recipe just didn't read enough like an egg salad to me, but I'd happily try it again as a potato salad (without the eggs). And although the texture of Aikens' recipe wasn't my favorite, it inspired me to try adding olives to my own.
Click to check out the other celebrity-chef recipes we've put head-to-head so far.
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