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