Until very recently, I didn’t know that white jeans are considered by some in the United States to be acceptable only between Memorial Day and Labor Day. I’d been wearing mine all winter.
It first struck me as one of those things that exists simply because it always has, handed down with great conviction. Food is full of these.
Don’t eat oysters in months without an R. Swallow a cherry stone, and a tree will grow inside you. Add oil to pasta water to prevent the noodles from sticking together (it just makes everything slippery and stops the sauce from clinging). I grew up with the notions that drinking water after eating watermelon wasn’t good for my tummy and that chocolate would give me acne.
Some of these are obviously nonsense; others have some justification. The wearing white-rule, on reflection, probably made sense when it was introduced: Before air conditioning and moisture-wicking fabrics, wearing white in summer kept you cooler. On the partly paved streets of the early 1900s, winter mud splashes must have posed a serious problem.
The oyster rule has a similar rationale. Before refrigeration, oysters spoiled in warm weather — hence the warning to avoid eating them in months containing an R, which neatly skips the summer. Now, oysters travel cold from boat to plate, the spoilage risk far reduced, and I still feel a little hesitation ordering them in July. Something in me has absorbed the rule without quite absorbing the reason for it.
Which is, I think, true of many rules: The instruction lingers long past the logic, and eventually the logic gets left behind altogether.
Which brings me to potato salad.
I’ve been thinking about what potato salad actually does — what job it performs and why it’s always there alongside the grilled things, without anyone really questioning it.
It’s the only thing on the table that does something different: a cold and creamy counter to all that heat and char. So many dishes work this way. Their whole reason for existing is a function, a solution to a problem. Gravy exists because roasted meat loses its fat and moisture in the oven and needs them put back. The lemon wedge alongside fried or grilled fish is just acid cutting through fat, one of the simplest moves. Once you fall in love with the solution, you stop seeing it as a solution at all. The rule, again, outlives the reason.
Potato salad is just one way to solve the problem. Hearty potatoes lend themselves to being prepared ahead and absorbing flavors; you can make your salad the day before, it gets better as it sits, and by the time everyone’s standing around with their plates, it’s doing exactly what it’s supposed to. It’s a very good solution, but not the only one.
This salad uses chickpeas instead. They can also work because chickpeas are creamy in a way that potatoes are, but they’re lighter. They hold dressing, and they don’t turn to mush if they sit out. The end result is still creamy, dressed in Greek yogurt, mayo and mustard, and still built for a table in the sun. I like to spoon over a salsa of lemons roasted until blackened at the edges, tossed with cucumber, sweet dill pickles, jalapeño and a great deal of fresh dill.
Chickpea salad, dressed this way or any other, could and should become an unchallenged fundamental for all summer garden parties. I can easily see a time when people will just take it for granted. I already do.
Follow New York Times Cooking on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok and Pinterest. Get regular updates from New York Times Cooking, with recipe suggestions, cooking tips and shopping advice.
