Salad Nicoise

This is a nice French style tuna salad with potatoes and Nicoise olives and served with a Lemon Vinaigrette dressing. The anchovies also add an nice twist, even though that’s pretty much Italian. You need to cook the potatoes and eggs several hours before serving so they have a chance to cook and then cool.

Ingredients

• 5 oz can Tuna – drained
• 8 oz Potatoes – peeled and quartered – or cut into 3/4″ cubes
• 8 oz Salad greens – dealer’s choice
• 4 Anchovy fillets
• 3 Eggs – boiled
• 3 Roma tomatos – thinly sliced
• 0.5 Onion – thinly sliced – use mandolin
• 0.33 cup Fresh Beans – rinsed, trimmed, and blanched
• 0.25 cup Nicoise olives – pitted (optionally halfed)
• 0.25 cup Parsely – chopped
• 1 TBL Capers
• Lemon Vinaigrette
  • 2 oz Olive oil
  • 2 TBL lemon Juice – fresh
  • 2 TBL Shallot – finely minced
  • 0.25 tsp Kosher salt
  • 0.25 tsp Black pepper

Process

1. Mise en Place: Measure and prepare your ingredients prior to starting.
2. Bring pot of salted water to a boil. Add potato cubes and boil 15 mins until fork tender.
3. Drain and let cool completely.
4. Bring another pot of water to a boil and cook eggs ~7 mins. Can cook to hard boil or to semi-hard, depends on how you want to present the salad. Can spin test eggs for level of being done.
5. Soak eggs in ice bath (cools them quickly and makes peeling easier).
6. Combine potatoes, parsley, olives, onions, tuna, and green beans. Refrigerate 4 hrs.
7. Toss greens with vinaigrette. Top with potato mixture and garnish with eggs, capers, and anchovies.

The egg spin test is to stand egg upright on flat surface and spin it like a top. If the egg lays over right away, there is still liquid in the yolk. If it spins like a top, the yolk is completely cooked.