Salad
Salad Niçoise

This recipe was featured on "You're the Chef" episode #110. Buy this episode from WVIA.

Yield: two salads

Ingredients:

1/2 lb.	cooked small red skin potatoes, cooled and cut into thick slices
1/2 lb.	fresh green beans, trimmed, cooked just tender, and shocked in cold water
1/4 c.	black olives, sliced
1 each	ripe tomato, cut into wedges
1 Tbsp.	chopped fresh parsley
6 Tbsp.	olive oil
2 Tbsp.	red wine vinegar
1 Tbsp.	chopped fresh garlic
to taste	salt
to taste	ground white pepper
1 head	Boston or "bibb" lettuce, cored, trimmed, washed and crisped
1/2 lb.	fresh yellow fin or big eye tuna
as needed	fresh coarse ground black pepper
as needed	salt
as needed	salad oil
2 each	large eggs, hard cooked, yellow and whites chopped separately

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Procedure:
Prepare potatoes and green beans; keep them refrigerated until you are ready to serve.

Just before service, combine the olive oil, vinegar, parsley, garlic, salt and pepper. Add the tomatoes and olives. Add the potatoes and green beans.

Toss all the vegetables in the dressing until they are well-coated. Divide the Boston lettuce in half, opening up the head with your thumb and fore finger from the core side of the lettuce. Place the Boston lettuce on a dinner plate, top it with the vegetables and dressing.

Coat the tuna with oil and season with salt and pepper. Preheat a medium sauté pan over high heat and sear the tuna for about 1 minute on each side until it is browned. Lower the heat and cook the tuna for about 2 minutes on each side, until it is medium doneness. (If you cook the tuna until it is well done, you can substitute canned tuna -- it will taste the same and will be half the cost.) Place the tuna on a plate and hold briefly until service.

Slice the tuna or cut it into large diced pieces (the tuna can be served chilled or warm); place equal amounts on top of the vegetables. Sprinkle the cooked yolk and white of the egg on top of the salad. Serve with additional fresh ground black pepper.

Traditional Salad Niçoise also has anchovy fillets tossed in with the vegetables. Add them as you like, about 6 fillets for the entire recipe.