Niçoise Salad

Happy new year (a few days late)! I hope you all had a wonderful holiday, and I am back to blogging (have you noticed?)! I kind of fell off the map as we got to Christmas break because we were so busy getting ready and traveling for the holidays. We went to Lexington to watch John's sister graduate from college, and we also went to Chicago for several days to see my family. We made it back late Christmas night in time to celebrate with John's family. We had a truly wonderful holiday.

However, in going home to Chicago I indulged way too much with all the amazing home cooking! I definitely needed to get back on track with working out and eating healthy (while indulging in moderation!), as I mentioned in my post about Resolutions. This salad was a great start to getting back to my routine.

I adapted this recipe from The Illustrated Kitchen Bible. John's mom saw this in Napa and grabbed it for me because there is a picture of every single dish! She knows how I love having pictures of food before I make it (and after as you can clearly tell!), and this book was perfect! It was so many yummy recipes that I'm going to be trying out in the near future. Not to mention it gives you great step-by-step tips for things like how to make an omelet, cooking meat, etc.

I changed up this recipe to meet our taste preferences and also to use what I had in the fridge. I am very glad I changed the dressing up, too, because it was perfect! Such a nice and filling dish without being heavy. John texted me at work to tell me "That was a good salad! I legit really liked it! GREAT dressing!" So there you have it. Perfect way to get on track for the new year. Cheers!

Niçoise Salad
Recipe by Call Me Mrs. Rapp; Adapted from The Illustrated Kitchen Bible
Serves 4, depending on portions
Pin It
Ingredients:
*lettuce (I used a whole bag of spring mix, but romaine would be nice too)
*2 tuna steaks
*3 hard-boiled eggs, sliced in half
*6 asparagus spears, cooked & sliced in half (original recipe calls for green beans)
*8-10 fresh basil leaves
*grape tomatoes, sliced in half (I didn't have these but it's in original recipe and would be great)
*1/2 cup olive oil
*2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
*1 tbsp. white balsamic vinegar
*1 clove garlic, minced
*2 tsps. dijon mustard
*salt and pepper

Preparation:
*Preheat an outdoor grill or indoor grill pan (my burners were on medium-high). 

*Drizzle olive oil and salt and pepper on both sides of tuna steaks. Grill tuna -for about 2-2 1/2 minutes on each side. You want the inside to be warm but light pink.

*For dressing: Combine vinegar, garlic and dijon mustard in a small bowl using a whisk. Once combined, slowly add olive oil, whisking as you pour. 

*Toss lettuce, basil, asparagus, tomatoes and dressing together. Add hard boiled egg slices to each salad bowl/plate, and top with tuna steak.

*Enjoy!

first side done! (thankful for the hubby fanning our smoke detector because this grill pan smokes up the place!)

Note: If you use one of these cute olive oil holders, it will take forever to pour it into this cup and your arm might feel like falling off after completing a circuit arm workout leaving your arms feeling like jello.

dressing!

dressing is on, ready to toss

ta-da! tomatoes would make this so much prettier...

mmm

salad without tuna!

I put my tuna on the side and picked up a bite before each bite of salad. Perfect!