Nicoise Salad (Reinvented)

This was a request from my facebook fan page, and we enjoyed it for dinner last night. Traditional Nicoise Salad features raw vegetables, nicoise olives, tinned anchovies and Dijon vinagrette. The recipe below has the basics- lettuce, vegetables, olives and fish. But they are all updated versions! I used green leaf lettuce, raw and cooked vegetables, kalamata olives and seared yellow fin tuna. I also tried to spice things up by making a roasted red pepper vinaigrette.

This is a great weeknight meal, or something to share with friends for dinner. I served this with a pasta dish, but you could also just add a great crusty baguette to round out the meal.

Nicoise Salad Reinvented, serves 4
1 lb yellow fin tuna steaks
2 heads of green leaf lettuce
2 large eggs, hard boiled and sliced in half
20 green beans, trimmed
½ cup cherry tomatoes, sliced in half
1 large roasted red pepper thinly sliced (if from a jar, make sure it is water packed)
½ lb small potatoes, red or white
Kosher salt and black pepper
Flat leaf parsley, minced

Roasted Red Pepper Vinaigrette
1 Tbs of fresh basil leaves
2 cloves garlic
1 large roasted red pepper
1/8 cup red wine vinaigrette
¼ cup olive oil
Kosher salt and black pepper

Bring a medium sized pot of salted water to a boil. Add the green beans and let them cook for about 2 minutes. Meanwhile prepare an ice bath. (A bowl filled with ice and water). Remove the beans with a Chinese spider or with tongs and plunge the beans into the ice water to stop the cooking. Set the beans aside.

Bring the water back to a boil and cook the potatoes until tender, 15-20 minutes. Slice the potatoes and set aside.

Season the tuna with kosher salt and black pepper on both sides.

Bring a nonstick pan up to medium-high heat, and sear the tuna, about 30 seconds to 1 minute on each side, depending how cooked through you like it. Cut the tuna into ¼” thick slices and set aside.

Cut the lettuce into bit sized pieces and reserve them in a bowl.

For the vinaigrette, put all of the ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth and creamy.

Use about ½ of the vinaigrette to toss with the lettuce in a bowl. Empty the salad onto a platter. Top the lettuce with the potatoes and the green beans.

Add the roasted red pepper strips, cherry tomatoes and kalamata olives.

Top the salad with the seared tuna and garnish with the hardboiled eggs. Drizzle everything with some of the remaining dressing and sprinkle with a little flat leaf parsley.