Vegetarian Niçoise Salad with Jammy Eggs and Crispy Roast Potatoes

This is a magical salad that works well for both lunches and dinners. It's also an incredible dinner party dish to serve, especially during the summer when you want something bright and fresh while also being filling enough. This recipe serves 2, but it easily scales for a much bigger group. While nicoise salad is typically served with seared tuna, I often like to use a simple roast salmon, grilled shrimp, or just with the jammy eggs as I do here for a vegetarian option. This recipe is also gluten and dairy free.

Traditional nicoise also uses boiled potatoes, which I find to be bland and boring - instead I roast halved baby potatoes until super crispy, and if you get the little pee wee size potatoes they roast up really quickly while you're prepping everything else in the salad.

The other thing I love about this salad is it can all be served cold - so it's the perfect dish to prep all the ingredients ahead and plate whenever you're ready to eat. Literally every part of the salad can be prepped ahead (soft boiling eggs, blanching green beens, roasting potatoes, chopping tomatoes and olives, and making the vinaigrette). Each part of the salad can be stored in the fridge for a few days, so if you like it on night one it's great for leftover lunches later during the week or for meal prep!

When I boil the eggs (7 minutes for a perfectly jammy center), I tend to boil more than I need for the salad and use the jammy boiled eggs for a snack or quick breakfast or lunch later in the week. As long as all the eggs are submerged in the boiling water, you can cook as many of them as you like at once.

The vinaigrette for this salad is one of my favorites - a bright and acidic dijon vinaigrette. The vinaigrette keeps for a week in the fridge, so if you have extra left over you can use it on pretty much anything!