Salad Niçoise

Originally published on August 19, 2014

Today I wanted to do a classic Niçoise salad.  It’s something I have wanted to try for years but for some odd reason never had the ingredients all at once.  Salad Niçoise is named from it’s origin in Nice, a region in France.  The original salad usually included tomatoes, anchovies, black olives, capers, French cut green beans and topped with a vinaigrette.  There are many variations of this yummy salad and the popular version is typically made up of lettuce, tomatoes, tuna, boiled potatoes and slightly cooked green beans.  Many chefs argue what is a “true” Niçoise and lots of them simply use what is available in their region.  Although there can be much debate concerning its contents, in my humble opinion there is no incorrect version of Niçoise.  It’s a very eye-pleasing salad that is also incredibly tasty, and the fresher ingredients the better.  I think people should try every kind they can get their hands on!

Classic Salad Niçoise

In this first variation I started my salad with a bed of spinach and Romaine lettuce.  I topped it with sliced Roma tomatoes, hard-boiled eggs, cooked Yukon gold potatoes, blanched green beans, canned tuna, red onions, radishes, black olives (sorry, no Niçoise olives to be found at my local stores), and red pepper.  The only seasoning used here was sea salt and fresh ground pepper.  DEEEELISH!

There’s really not much of a recipe to post, it’s basically all assembly.  You have to precook a few of the veggies though.  It’s a bit of a pain to do, but this salad is worth every bit of hassle.  There is no set way of assembly, just arrange your veggies in any way that tickles your fancy.  The finished product is amazing!

My Niçoise- Take Two

This second variation is the Paper Plate Diva version of Niçoise (aka mommy-passed-a-kidney-stone-this-morning-and-we’re-lucky-it-ain’t-a-frozen-pizza).   I used whatever was on hand and I must say this turned out quite delicious.  I didn’t have any lettuce or olives so I used some fresh cooked beets, cooked red potatoes, canned French green beans, hard-boiled eggs, green pepper, canned tuna, radishes, and garnished with cucumber slices, red onion and white onion.  I dressed the salad with sea salt, black pepper, olive oil and balsamic vinegar.  This was really nummy as well and even the kids loved it!  Next time I try Niçoise I’m gonna go all fancy and grill some tuna or salmon.