Mami's Japanese Potato Salad

Many years ago when my children were little, we had a Japanese student stay with us. Her name was Mami and she made a great house guest. Just before she left she made a meal for us, this was part of that meal. The recipe was one of her mum’s and she said she enjoyed leftovers for breakfast.
I had almost forgotten about this recipe until I came across something similar while searching through zaars. I was trying to find something Japanese to cook to follow our family tradition of eating from the host country of the F1 Grand Prix. The flavours are wonderfully fresh. Serve it at room temperature for best results.



650g Potatoes, leave whole
200g carrots
1 chicken stock cube
100g cucumber
½ tsp salt
1 cup (200 ml) mayonnaise
Salt to taste
Ground black pepper
200g Crab stick

1. Wash the potatoes and carrots but do not peel.
2. Place in a pan of hot water which you have added the chicken stock cube and cook for about 25 minutes over a medium heat, Prick the vegetables with a skewer to see if cooked and remove when done.
3. Peel the potatoes and carrots while hot and then transfer the potatoes to a bowl and roughly break up, leave to cool.
4. Chop the carrots in half length ways and slice into 5 mm thick semi-circular pieces.
5. Cut the cucumber in half lengthways and use a spoon, remove the seeds. Cut each half again lengthways and then slice into 5 mm thick pieces.
6. In a separate bowl, sprinkle salt over the cucumber and leave for about 2-3 minutes to soften, and then squeeze to remove excess liquid.
7. Cut the onion in half, slice and soak in water to remove any bitterness, then drain and pat dry.
8. Cut the crab sticks into 1 cm cubes
9. When the potato is cool, stir in the mayonnaise, salt and pepper add the crab sticks, carrots, cucumber and onions and lightly mix.
10. Serve at room temperature.