Nicoise Salad
on Feb 27, 2023, Updated Jun 11, 2025
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This Mediterranean-inspired salad is beautiful to look at, and eating it will seriously make you want to do a happy dance.
This beautiful salad, featuring tuna, Niçoise olives, potatoes, roasted peppers, green beans, and perfectly hard-boiled eggs, is a stylish classic. And the Mediterranean-inspired dressing makes the whole thing sing. This Niçoise Salad recipe makes a perfect lunch or light dinner any time of year.
On one trip to Nice, France, I ate a Niçoise salad every single day for over a week, and didn’t get tired of it. And this composed salad is so easy to pull together at home, especially with canned or jarred tuna. Buy the best tuna you can find, preferably packed in oil — it will make all the difference.
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Start the meal with crusty bread and homemade black olive tapenade.
What's In This Post?
Niçoise (pronounced nee-swaaz) means “of Nice,” meaning the town in Provence, France, where this salad was invented. Interestingly, this was once a type of dish eaten by poor folks, with tomatoes, potatoes, and olive oil — very simple and filling. Over time, other ingredients were added, and now this composed salad is usually more ornate than that original ingredient combo.
My version includes lettuce, potatoes, green beans (or haricot verts), roasted peppers, hard-cooked eggs, tuna, red onion, black olives (preferably Niçoise olives!), and finishes with optional capers and anchovy fillets. The vinaigrette is made with olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, anchovies, and garlic.
Fresh vs. Canned Tuna in Salad Nicoise
The short answer is you can use either. If you have a fresh piece of tuna, use that! Season it with salt and pepper, sear it well on both sides in a bit of olive oil, and then slice it and give it a quick sprinkle with red wine vinegar. Distribute it over the salad.
Otherwise, you can absolutely use canned tuna, which is what I call for here. You really can use whatever canned tuna you have. Here are tips for choosing the best canned tuna:
- Pick an imported canned or tinned or jarred tuna, such as one from Italy (I like the Tonnino brand, which is readily available at good markets and online).
- Choose tuna packed in oil, not water.
- Skip the white tuna in favor of dark tuna here, as it has more flavor.
- Leave the tuna in sizable chunks on the salad.
Salade Nicoise Tips and Variations
- I took a technique from making classic French potato salad, which includes tossing the hot cooked potatoes with white wine before dressing the salad. This just added a simple but notable layer of sophisticated Provençal flavor to the salad recipe.
- Also, please don’t skip the anchovies in the dressing unless you are making a vegetarian version of this salad with no fish at all. You won’t taste the strong, salty flavor of anchovies, but they add an important level of umami salinity to the dressing, which is amazing. You can also add some additional anchovy filets to the salad, which some people love, and others not so much. I love them.
- Serve the salad in a large, shallow bowl or on a large platter. Distribute the ingredients attractively over the lettuce base, and drizzle the dressing over the top. Don’t toss it before serving to maximize the eye appeal of this composed salad. Or, you can plate it up on individual plates instead of a communal serving bowl, dividing the ingredients evenly between the portions.
- Feel free to play around with the components. The following combo is very classic, but many Salade Nicoises also include cherry tomatoes, raw red bell peppers, or cucumbers, which you should feel free to add or substitute. You want a lot of color in this salad, which is easy to get with an assortment of vegetables.
- Try using half vinegar, half fresh lemon juice in the dressing.
- Add some fresh chiffonaded basil to the salad.
How to Make Salad Niçoise With Canned Tuna
- Make the vinaigrette: In a small bowl or container, combine the olive oil, vinegar, parsley, anchovies, Dijon mustard, garlic, salt, and pepper.
- Cook the veggies: Meanwhile, cook the potatoes in a pot of salted boiling water. When the potatoes are almost tender, add the green beans and continue to cook both for another 3 minutes until all of the vegetables are tender. Drain and submerge the potatoes and beans in an ice water bath for a couple of minutes. Drain and return the vegetables to the bowl. Drizzle the white wine on top and toss.
- Build the salad: Place the lettuce in a large shallow serving bowl. Arrange the toppings attractively over the salad greens. Distribute the capers and/or anchovies over the top of the salad.
- Dress and serve: Whisk or shake the dressing to recombine, and drizzle it over the salad. Garnish with a few fresh thyme sprigs if desired.
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Salade Nicoise
Ingredients
For the Vinaigrette:
- ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- ⅓ cup red wine vinegar
- 2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
- 1 tablespoon minced anchovies or anchovy paste
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- 1 teaspoon finely minced garlic
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper (to taste)
For the Salad:
- 3 waxy potatoes (about 3/4 pound; scrubbed and cut into 1-inch cubes)
- ½ pound haricot verts or thin green beans (trimmed and cut into 2-inch pieces)
- ¼ cup dry white wine
- 2 large heads butter or bibb lettuce (torn into bite-sized pieces; about 8 cups)
- ½ red onion (thinly sliced)
- 2 (6 ounce) cans or jars dark tuna in oil (drained and flaked into chunks)
- 4 hard-cooked eggs (quartered)
- ¾ cup pitted Nicoise olives (or other oil-packed black olives)
- 1 roasted bell pepper (jarred or homemade; thinly sliced)
- 2 tablespoons drained capers (optional)
- 4 to 6 drained and rinsed anchovies (optional)
Instructions
- Make the vinaigrette: In a small bowl or container, combine the olive oil, vinegar, parsley, anchovies, Dijon mustard, garlic, salt, and pepper.
- Meanwhile, bring a medium pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. Fill a large bowl with ice water and keep it on the side. Add the potatoes and allow the water to return to a simmer, then adjust the heat and simmer the potatoes for about 7 minutes until they are close to tender, but still firm. Add the green beans and continue to cook both for another 3 minutes, until all the vegetables are tender. Drain and submerge the potatoes and beans in the ice water.
- Allow the vegetables to cool in the water for a minute, then drain, dump out the ice water, and return the vegetables to the bowl. Drizzle white wine over top and toss.
- Place the lettuce in a large shallow serving bowl, or divide it between 6 individual plates or shallow bowls. Arrange the toppings attractively over the lettuce; the potatoes, green beans, onions, tuna, hard-cooked eggs, olives, and red peppers. Distribute the capers and/or anchovies over the top of the salad.
- Stir or shake the dressing to recombine, and drizzle over the salad.
Notes
- If you want to use fresh tuna, pick a steak about 1 inch thick. Season with salt and pepper, and sear it well on both sides in a bit of olive oil. Slice the tuna and sprinkle with red wine vinegar. Distribute it over the salad.
- Leftover Nicoise salad will keep in a container in the fridge for a day or so, though the lettuce will get soggy if the salad is dressed (which I don’t particularly mind!).
