Ask two people from Provence for the correct recipe for salade niçoise, and you can guarantee that the two answers will be different. Ask ten locals, and you’ll come back with ten different methods. Each individual will also provide you with a stream of reasons as to why the other suggestions are wrong.

As an example, a former mayor of Nice once said: “What crimes are committed upon this pure, fresh salad, which is based on tomatoes and, save for the eggs, is made exclusively with raw ingredients. It is prepared without vinegar, its tomatoes are seasoned three times, and it is drizzled with olive oil. I implore anyone who wishes to preserve the reputation of our local cuisine to never, ever add even the smallest amount of cooked vegetables or potatoes to their niçoise salad.”


From the outside, it all looks very straightforward: the term “à la niçoise” has been used in French cooking for over 120 years to describe a garnish of tomatoes, olives and anchovies. With these ingredients and a little vinaigrette, practically any everyday salad can be transformed into a salade niçoise.

This description first appeared in 1893 in the magazine “L’Art Culinaire”. A very early recipe for the salad can be found in the popular encyclopaedia “Almanach Hachette” from 1900. In this, tomatoes, artichokes, potatoes and green beans are used. At around the same time, Auguste Escoffier worked as a chef at the César Ritz hotel in Paris and the Ritz hotel in London. In his “Guide Culinaire” (“Culinary Guide”), published in 1903, he provided what today is one of the best-known recipes for salade niçoise: to the trio of tomatoes, olives and anchovies, Escoffier added green beans, potatoes and capers.

The salade niçoise reaches a state approaching perfection in an official recipe provided by the city of Nice (http://www.nicerendezvous.com/car/200908023466/actu-n-1335.html ). Alongside the ingredients stated by Escoffier, this features small green peppers, white onion, green salad, tuna, small violet artichokes, basil, celery hearts, cucumber and hard-boiled eggs. For the vinaigrette of course, true connoisseurs only use olive oil AOC de Nice, Dijon mustard and red wine vinegar.

Text: Rainer Meier

SALADE NIÇOISE

Ingredients:
Serves 4

3–4 tbsp red wine vinegar
salt
freshly ground black pepper
6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil,
1 medium-sized red onion (thinly sliced into rings)
4–5 medium-sized boiled potatoes (diced)
250 g green beans (cleaned)
1 green pepper (cleaned, cut into thin strips)
1 medium-sized courgette (sliced)
4 ripe aromatic tomatoes (cut into eighths)
1 tin tuna (drained, broken into pieces)
8 black olives
6–8 anchovy fillets (rinsed, roughly chopped)
3–4 tbsp capers (drained)
2 eggs (hard boiled, cut into eighths)

Instructions:
1. Mix the vinegar with some salt and pepper, then slowly add 4 tbsp olive oil while constantly stirring. Place the sliced onions and diced boiled potatoes into the dressing.

2. Cook the beans in heavily salted water for 8 minutes until just cooked, then cool in cold water and cut into pieces.

3. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a pan. First lightly cook the strips of pepper for 1 minute while constantly stirring, then remove them from the pan. Following this, brown the courgette slices in 2 portions. Add a little more oil into the pan. Leave everything to cool.

4. Put the beans, strips of pepper, courgette slices, tomato, tuna, olives and anchovies into a salad bowl. Scatter capers over the top, and season with pepper. Pour the dressing over the top, mix everything, and leave to infuse.

5. Serve the salad onto plates, and lay the egg pieces on top. Serve with a fresh baguette.