DIY Cooking: How to Make Macaroni Salad

I’ve never been a big fan of mayonnaise-based salads. Now don’t get me wrong, I like mayonnaise on my sandwiches, on my burgers, even on my hot dogs sometimes. But too much mayonnaise in my potato salad or macaroni salad, and… I just can’t. One day though, out of nowhere, I suddenly started craving macaroni salad. But again, I didn’t want it to be too mayonnaise-y. So I decided to DIY my own macaroni. And surprisingly, the “do it yourself” aspect of the DIY was pretty simple – I created this macaroni salad pretty easily.

This easy DIY macaroni salad is fast to make, and it’s a crowd favorite. Seriously, make it for Memorial Day, a summer picnic, or a potluck at any time of the year, and you’re going to get rave reviews. Now, I’m going to preface my “DIY” macaroni salad recipe with a few of the varying aspects that make it so, so delicious.

1. I used mayonnaise made with olive oil. Mayonnaise with olive oil is higher in heart-healthy monounsaturated fats, and it tends to combine olive oil with other vegetable oils so that the flavor isn’t too overpowering. As I said earlier, I don’t like really heavy mayonnaise-laden salads, so the mayo with olive oil lightened up my macaroni salad quite a bit.
2. I added hard-boiled eggs to my DIY macaroni salad. The yolk from the eggs added a rich creaminess to the mayonnaise mixture, without adding too much fat. And the egg whites add extra variety and texture.I like to use this method for boiling my eggs: How to Hard-Boil Eggs – it’s a pretty much foolproof method of getting properly cooked eggs every time.
3. I really like red onion, but the first time I made this salad, the onions were way too strong. I learned that if you cut up your red onion and then soak it in cold water for a little while, it will reduce the “bite” of the onions. So you still have the yummy red onion taste, without all the pungency.**Update** I generally don’t put the red onion in my DIY macaroni salad anymore. While the cold water method does help a little, the red onions are just so overwhelming, it’s not worth all the extra de-odorizing for me.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound elbow macaroni, cooked until it is a tad past al dente
• 2 cups ham, diced
• 3 hard-boiled eggs, chopped
• 1/4 red onion, chopped and soaked in cold water for about 30 minutes
• 4 ribs celery, chopped (=about 1 and 1/2 cups)
• 2 cups reduced fat mayonnaise
• 1 teaspoon lemon pepper
• 1 teaspoon celery salt

Directions:

• Combine olive oil mayonnaise, lemon pepper, and celery salt
• Add mayonnaise mixture to remaining ingredients, stir until thoroughly combined
• Enjoy your DIY macaroni salad!

This is a DIY macaroni salad, meaning it’s all yours to customize as you’d like. You can take out the onions or ham if they’re not your style, and add in any other ingredients that you think might be yummy. Depending on who/what I’m making MY DIY salad for, sometimes I’ll add in black olives or bacon bits. Because the olive oil mayonnaise is not too overwhelming, the sky really is the limit with what you can add in.