Tuesday, August 18, 2009

What's Cooking Wednesday: Farmers Market Niçoise



Please go to The Fairy Blogmother for more What's Cooking Wednesday participants.

I had the farm share of all farm shares last week, as our share partners were out of town, and it is most definitely peak season. Our Tantre box was filled to the brim with corn and lettuce, beets and eggplant, basil, parsley, summer squash, carrots, both green beans and purple beans, tomatoes, potatoes and an orange-fleshed honeydew that tasted deliciously sweet and had a hint of rosewater.

We cooked up the corn the first night, because you just have to eat corn as fresh as can be, and we used much of the other bounty quickly. By the weekend, however, we still had all of the wonderful makings of a Salade Niçoise, plus some corn kernels that had to be used up. With the addition of some hard-boiled eggs, a can of tuna packed in oil (which is what I really need for Niçoise), some olives from Plum Market's olive bar and a loaf of home made bread via Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, it was a delicious, and relatively easy, summer dinner. The ingredients that are starred are all veggies that you can find fresh and local at the Farmers Market (or other area markets) right now.

A2eatwrite's Farmers Market Niçoise

Ingredients

*4 small red-skinned potatoes, quartered, steamed or boiled to fork tender, and cooled
*4 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and quartered (better and fresher if you get them from a local farmer)
1 can of tuna packed in olive oil
*2 cups of rinsed, washed lettuce leaves
*2 cups of green beans, steamed briefly (1 minute or less) and chilled ahead of time (OR... 1 cup of green beans, steamed as above and 1 cup of purple beans, raw, so they retain their color)
*fresh corn kernels off of two small cobs (or one large one)
*2 tomatoes, cut into 1/8ths
1/2 cup of niçoise or other small, black olives

For the dressing:

*1 large garlic clove, minced
1/2 tsp salt
1 TBS red wine vinegar
1 1/2 TBS olive oil

Directions

1. Mash the garlic together with the salt (I find a mortar and pestle works best for this) - scrap mixture into a small bowl and whisk in vinegar. Finally, whisk in olive oil until emulsified. Set aside.
2. Place rinsed lettuce leaves on the bottom of a platter.
3. Place tomatoes and beans around the platter and make sure coverage is complete, ie. you will get beans and tomatoes with each serving.
4. Do the same with the cooled potatoes and egg quarters.
5. Scatter the corn, olives and tuna on top of the salad.
6. Drizzle dressing over the salad. Sprinkle with freshly ground pepper.

Serves four.

Enjoy!



Nutrition Facts

4 Servings

Amount Per Serving
Calories 398.3
Total Fat 17.8 g
Saturated Fat 3.1 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 2.8 g
Monounsaturated Fat 7.2 g
Cholesterol 219.7 mg
Sodium 609.7 mg
Potassium 1,217.8 mg
Total Carbohydrate 37.3 g
Dietary Fiber 5.9 g
Sugars 2.2 g
Protein 24.8 g

As always, nutrition info supplied by the recipe calculator function at Sparkrecipes.com.

If you'd be so kind, please leave your comments and/or votes here.

22 comments:

Brian Miller said...

yum. there is just something about fresh food...so much life still in them...

Jen said...

Brian - I agree - I guess that's a lot of what the raw foods movement is about, too.

Lauren said...

That looks fantastic. I love French food. So simple and fresh...this is inspiring me to make a salade niçoise of my own this week!

Unknown said...

I love Salade Nicoise - yum yum yum. And I love your farmers market approach to it :)

Unknown said...

Oh, and WCW is up on my blog too - a bit earlier than usual :)

Jen said...

Lauren, I couldn't agree with you more!

City Girl - thanks! I'll be over to your place a bit later in the day... deadlines approach. ;-)

Jeanie said...

Looks totally fabulous! I still am envious of your farm share idea! That's so cool -- and I know exactly what you mean about the corn. Yum!

Unknown said...

Thanks for asking what we ate the tomatillo avocado salsa with - I went back and edited my post. I had the salsa with a spinach black bean taco, while husband had a chicken taco. This salsa (and the mango habanero one) seems to be a great topping for just about anything. I bet it would be great on your fish tacos. :)

Jen said...

City Girl - It would, indeed! BTW... I'm going to get a link to you for what we had for dinner tonight - I think it fits with your program and OMG, it is SO good!

muzzyblue said...

This salad looks terrific, and so nutritionally balanced, too. It has all my favorite stuff, too!

Susan @ SGCC said...

Gorgeous salad! This is one of my favorite summer evening meals. How lucky you are to have access to all of those lovely veggies!

Merry said...

That looks divine! I've never had Nicioise so I'll have to try it!

Goofball said...

oh yeah, I could totally do this.

Jen said...

Jane - I've loved versions of this salad ever since the 70s when it made it over from France (probably via Julia).

Susan - we are, indeed. There's no doubt that the freshness adds tremendously!

Merry - I think you'd enjoy it. It's hard not to like it unless you have an aversion to any of the specific ingredients.

Yeah, Goofball! I haven't heard that from you too often. ;-)

Rosa's Yummy Yums said...

Just the kind of salad I'd like to eat now with this terrible heat (36° C/65% humidity)!

Cheers,

Rosa

Valerie Harrison (bellini) said...

Just love this recipe Jen. I think that fresh salmon would be awesome as well.

Thistlemoon said...

This is definitely one of my favorite salads of all time - just brimming with lots of delicious flavors! Your photo is beautiful also.

hotmamamia said...

I'm really glad you keep putting the paper link on the blog...makes it easy to get over there to tell you how wonderful you are! Great recipe and I voted too. Maybe this would have an anti-itch effect on me!

the twins said...

that looks great, i love salad nicoise!

noëlle {simmer down!} said...

I LOVE salade niçoise, thanks for reminding me about it, I haven't yet made it this summer. I fully agree with the olive-oil packed tuna. They used to sell a really good one at Trader Joe's but sadly they discontinued it, probably why I don't have any in the pantry!

zegliano said...

that nicoise looks amazing. it's totally making peace with my insomnia.

can't wait to make it next week~

allison @
http://lastbite.blogspot.com

Shayne said...

this is my all time favorite salad, it has everything that is good in life...or in food at least