My favorite summer salad, from Nice

Days after 9/11, the fish husband and I were in the south of France, and little local fire and police stations were all holding blood drives for the people of New York. It was incredibly touching, and it made me quite angry when we were told by our government that the French were no longer our friends and we had to change the name of French fries and French toast. Spare me. These people were lining up to give us their blood.
     Now the events this past week in Nice reminded me of that experience, so I looked for ways to help and found this recommended web site: http://www.giveforfrance.org/en, with the added suggestion of a donation to the French Red Cross. I made a donation, and then I made a Salade Nicoise.
     This wonderful summer salad is great for summer entertaining, because you can make it all ahead of time, and because most of the ingredients come from your local farmer's market, just like they do in France. The recipe is on our web site http://www.burhopsseafood.com/swordfish--mahi-mahi--tuna.html.  I cheat a little, so that I don't leave so much cleaning up to do -- I boil the potatoes in a pan that's large enough to allow me to drop in the eggs to hard boil after the potatoes cook for 15 minutes, then a couple of minutes later I drop in the green beans to cook. Potatoes total cooking time is about 20-25 minutes, eggs 8 minutes, beans 6 minutes.

 I grill the tuna for about 3 minutes total -- 1/2 lb. of tuna is enough for a salad to feed 4 to 6 people. As you can see from the photo, we like our tuna on the rare side. (The potatoes are under the tuna. I use small round multi-color ones.)
     A few weeks ago we had the pleasure of dining with friends at Ravinia, where I ordered a Salade Nicoise, and it contained no potatoes, only a ton of chopped lettuce and some canned tuna. There were a few olives and a couple of beans, but it's supposed to be a potato salad! A really good one.
     The French are obsessive about their food, and the result is some of the best food anywhere in the world. They are also basically very nice people. It makes my heart ache to think of the terrible events of Bastile Day in Nice, and how terrified everyone must have been. My Salade Nicoise is a very small way of honoring them. The city of Nice and all of France is in my heart, they have suffered some horrible attacks in the past year, by a group of people who would have us believe that killing innocent strangers will somehow make us sympathetic to their cause. It's not working.