Simple Salad Nicoise

Sometimes my meals come from what I have in my cupboards and fridge, other times I just get an idea and I have to make it before it leaves me alone. This Salad Nicoise was one of the latter. It just came into my head during a morning work shift that all I wanted to eat for dinner was a Salad Nicoise, now I'm not a salad person at all. When I finished my shift, I cycled home passed the supermarket, bought the ingredients and arrived home to tell my wife what we were having for dinner.

Salad Nicoise, like all things with Nicoise attached to them, come from the region around Nice (In France). The typical ingredients in these dishes are garlic, anchovies, tomatoes, olive and French beans (also known as Green beans) and some kind of fish. This salad also has dozens of variations, some places use only fresh, seared tuna, others tinned, some will add cook vegetables, others won't, some won't even use lettuce. All are still Salad Nicoise and all taste fantastic.

This is my take upon this classic Southern French salad, so for 4 people you will need:-

1 medium sized Iceberg lettuce, washed and shredded
2 tins of Tuna chucks, drained
12 cherry tomatoes, halved
1 yellow pepper, sliced
8 new potatoes, boiled, cooled and cut into fours
4 eggs, cooked, peeled and cut into fours
6tbsp olive oil
2tbsp red wine vinegar
1tbsp Dijon mustard
1tsp salt
1tsp pepper

Start with making the dressing by whisking together the olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, salt and pepper. Leave to one side to infuse.

On your plates lay the lettcue first and the start adding the other ingredients. Leave the Tuna till last but besides that it does not really matter what order you have them in or how they look. Finish by topping it with the tuna and drizzling that dressing over it, about 2 tablespoons will do but you can always add more if you want.

That's it, very simple. The whole thing from start to finish shouldn't take more than 30 minutes including cooking of the potatoes and eggs.

So no more excuses about salads not being tasty.