For what it's worth, I've never lived in the midwest, but I know what you mean. My wife, whose family background is Baltic, loves every ingredient (separately and together), and Scandinavians will also surely like it.
Oh, and for people who want it to have a name, I made it specifically because I knew my wife would like it. I was right. Her name is Aina (not Anya, Aina; said like Ina but spelled Aina). So you can call it Aina Kleine Schinkenkäsegurkenkohlsalat. Or, I guess, Aina Special Salad.
Let's go! Start by getting a big mixing bowl. Into it, put two big splops of mayonnaise (like, serving spoon–size splops), a good squurrt of coleslaw dressing, a splodge of mustard (fancy, sweet, a bit hot if you want; Italian or French but not French's), two tablespoons of brine from the pickles…
…about which more in a moment, a dash or two of Worcestershire sauce (if you inadvertently make a joke about the pronunciation of that word, throw out the ingredients, go outside, lie on the cold sidewalk for five minutes and think of your sins, then come back in and start over), likewise of Tabasco
…and/or another hot sauce, and if you have a sweet hot sauce that's good too; toss in a bit of sugar or similar if not. Also you can put in a little green Chartreuse or (more likely) suitable imitation. But you don't have to. Then whisk it all together.
…take two very nice, if a bit pricey, dill pickles, dill, only dill, no garlic, no chilis, no mustard, just dill, why is this so hard, and also they should be good and crunchy. Cut the ends off and cut the rest into oblong pseudoparallelepipeds, i.e., pieces about like two cubes put together.
Comments
To start, here are the ingredients, except for the ones that didn’t make it to photo call. And the dressing ingredients. Wait…
And then…