My Very Own Niçoise Salad

Mid April, every year that I lived in France, my husband and I would receive an enormous FedEx box from his grandmother. It would contain branches of fragrant mimosa blossoms from her garden, a reminder that - though we in Paris were still living under gray skies and cold weather - springtime had awoken in the South of France.

And so, usually just a few weeks later, following the mimosa's Siren song, we would drive down to Bandol where my husband's grandmother lived and spend a delightful week there, also visiting Saint Tropez, Cassis, Marseille, Nice, and every little village in between. We would enjoy the sunshine, the local rosé wine, many a delicious seafood platter, Bouillabaisse at portside restaurants, and a myriad of Salades Niçoises, none which were ever exactly the same despite the base ingredients being identical.

I have been craving Salad Niçoise recently, maybe because this year's Spring is late and it is gray and cold here. My recipe, like those eaten in France, is a very personalized version of the famous salad from Nice and is a template rather than a recipe.

Dice a medium potato into small pieces and cook it in salted boiling water for seven minutes before draining well and setting aside to come to room temperature.

Boil an egg for six minutes and set it aside while you get on with the rest of the ingredients.

Cook a handful of green beans using the technique for Blistered Beans that I use for my holiday beans. Set aside.

Mix lemon juice and olive oil together in a jar to make a bright citrusy dressing. You can blitz anchovies in it as well, but I prefer to add some - whole - to the plate so that I can scoop them up with the potato and the egg.

To assemble the salad, start with a handful of buttery soft greens, with your favorite herb stirred through - in my case I use tarragon because the anise notes of tarragon remind me of Pernod, the South of France's ubiquitous apéritif.

Add some chunks of the ripest, most flavorful tomato you can find.

Add half a can of the very best tuna that you can buy. My local store was out of their delicious glass jars of tuna in oil, so I bought a can of wild-caught, dolphin-friendly, and sustainably sourced tuna. Yay me.

If you can find fresh pickled anchovies use those, otherwise buy a tin and add some to the plate.

Add the ingredients that you have cooked to the dish - potato, peeled egg and green beans - which should be room temperature by now.

Drizzle with the salad dressing and sprinkle on a bit of finishing salt. Most Niçoise salads have black olives - which I loathe - in them, feel free to add some now. I considered adding some capers to mimic the salty tang of the olives, but decided there was enough salt in my salad as is and omitted them.

There you go though, a good if untraditional Niçoise - maybe Spring will come sooner than you think.