Salmon Niçoise Salad
What’s your favorite way to eat leafy greens? They’re such a beautiful canvas for endless combinations of flavor. This Salmon Niçoise Salad is one of my favorites colorful, full of texture, and endlessly customizable.
There’s something about a colorful salad that just makes me happy. The rainbow of colors, variety of textures, and all of the possibilities of ingredients lends itself to a perfect dish.
Why You’ll Love this Salmon Niçoise Salad
I love that this Salmon Niçoise Salad recipe comes together with ingredients I usually have on hand, whether I’m keeping it simple for lunch or dressing it up with a beautiful piece of roasted salmon.
Growing up, my mom put a salad on the table every night. I have continued that tradition by introducing leafy greens to my own children. Whether they’re wilted into soups or served up in a vibrant display of color like this salad, I feel good knowing I am encouraging them to love greens as much as I do.
The base of all amazing salads starts with picking the right greens. Fresh Express makes it easy with their large variety of greens and chopped salads, as well as the way they are packaged. Not only are they already washed and chopped, the Keep-Crisp bag ensures that just picked crunch and freshness without any preservatives.
Fresh Express is the leader in the bagged salad category of produce. In 1989, they were the ones to introduce this concept to the market. With over 40 million pounds of salad sold monthly, they’re the brand I reach for when I’m shopping.
For this recipe I am using Fresh Express Leafy Green Romaine. The combination of crunchy romaine and tender green leaf lettuce makes and ideal base for all of the toppings.
Layers of Flavor
A classic Niçoise brings together briny olives, potatoes, and green beans with a bright vinaigrette. Here I’m putting my own spin on it with roasted salmon, blood oranges, and fennel for a burst of color and freshness.
This dish also lends itself well to meal prep. The potatoes, green beans, and eggs can all be cooked ahead of time and kept in the refrigerator, so when you’re ready to eat, all that’s left is to toss everything together.
While I roasted the salmon specifically for this salad, this dish is an ideal vehicle for leftovers. Whether its leftover salmon, chicken, or even steak, you can use the base ingredients and add your favorite protein. You can also keep this simple but just adding the soft boiled eggs as your protein. Packed with fresh flavors, rich with nutrients, this salad is sure to become one of your favorites.
Lettuce Talk about Salmon Niçoise Salad
Salads are all about having fun and building your layers of flavor. Let’s break down the components.
- Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
- Season your salmon fillets with kosher salt and black pepper and roast for about 20 minutes, until cooked through.
- Bring a medium saucepan of water to a boil and season generously with salt. Add your green beans and cook for about 5 minutes, just until crisp-tender and bright green.
- Use a slotted spoon to transfer the green beans straight into a large bowl of cold water to stop the cooking, then lay them on a paper towel to dry.
- Add your potatoes to the same pot of boiling water and cook until fork tender, then drain.
- For soft-boiled eggs, boil for 7–8 minutes, then peel once cool enough to handle.
- For the dressing, whisk together the olive oil, Dijon mustard, whole grain mustard, vinegar, a couple of teaspoons of salt, and black pepper — or shake it all together in a jar.
- Taste and adjust as needed.
- To assemble, arrange your greens on a platter.
- Top with the salmon, potatoes, green beans, olives, eggs, fennel, and blood oranges.
- Drizzle with the vinaigrette and enjoy.
This is a dish built for veggies and good ingredients doing the work a few tablespoons of olive oil, a squeeze of lemon juice if you like extra brightness, and whatever fresh herbs you have around make it your own every time.
Are you looking for more ways to use greens? Make sure you check out my recipe for Orange-Pomegranate Winter Salad.
Salmon Niçoise Salad
Equipment
- baking sheet
- bowl
- mason jar
Ingredients
Salmon Niçoise Salad
- 1/2 lbs salmon
- 1 pkg Fresh Express Leafy Green Romaine
- 1 cup Kalamata olives
- 1/2 fennel, sliced
- 2 soft boiled eggs
- 2 blood oranges, sliced
- handful of green beans
- 1 cup baby red potatoes
- 1 1/2 tsp salt, divided
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
Vinaigrette Dressing
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1 tsp Dijon mustard
- 1 tsp whole grain mustard
- 3 tbsp red wine vinegar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- 1 tsp orange zest
Instructions
Salmon Niçoise Salad
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Season the salmon with salt and pepper and place on a baking sheet. Bake for 20 minutes. You can also use leftover for this portion.
- Bring a saucepan of water to a boil and season with salt.
- Add the green beans and blanche for 5 minutes or until they turn bright green.
- Remove the green beans from the water and place them in a bowl of ice water to shock them and stop the cooking.
- To the same pot of boiling water add your potatoes. Cook until fork tender and then drain.
- To make your soft-boiled eggs boil for 7-8 minutes.
- To assemble your salad place a base of your Leafy Green Romaine onto a plate.
- Top with the salmon. Arrange your potatoes, green beans, soft boiled eggs, olives, fennel, and blood oranges on top.
- Dress with your vinaigrette.
Vinaigrette Dressing
- Add all of the ingredients to a jar and shake vigorously to combine.
