Nicoise toasts: a recipe

Nicoise toasts

I'm excited to be sharing this recipe with you ... finally.

You see, I thought I had lost my entire photo library two weeks ago.

For the average citizen, this would be tragic -- losing all those captured memories, once-in-lifetime shots, images of loved ones.

But for a food blogger? Ay yi yi!

As I have mentioned before, what you see here is what we eat. I don't create advanced posts and save them up and I certainly don't make special recipes only for the blog. Simply, I take photos of the food we eat about two seconds before we eat it. And, given how many awesome things there are to create and eat in the world, I find myself heeding Amanda Hesser's recent advice and rarely making the same dish twice.

(Except for salted oatmeal cookies. I'll continue to beat that dead horse over and over and over.)

So, if I lost the photos of what we've eaten, I'd have to try to recreate not only the recipes but also all the photos. You probably would have noticed a few week hiatus on the blog and heard me wailing all the way from wherever it is you live.

Luckily, data recovery software works and we're back in business here in Ninjaville.

Which leads us back to these nicoise toasts.

These are seriously awesome. As the name implies, they are the equivalent of a full nicoise salad in an open-faced sandwich format. The over-the-top awesome part is the capered (is that a word?) egg salad that forms the base for the leafy salad topping -- ahhhhh-mazingly delicious! Those little capers make a huge difference. And the salad is really tart and salty, creating the perfect foil for the creamy egg salad.

In fact, I'm thinking of just making the egg salad part for lunch today.

If you use larger slices of bread, these toasts are a full meal unto themselves -- perfect for a warm summer evening when you don't want to cook with heat. Additionally, topping smaller slices of a baguette, they'd be a wicked party appetizer.

As always, let me know what you think if you try this recipe.

Now go make a backup of your photos. Please.

Nicoise Toasts (adapted from Bon Appetit)

Ingredients:
4 hard-boiled eggs, chopped
3/4 cup reduced-fat cottage cheese
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley
1 cup Italian parsley leaves
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon capers (chop them a bit if they are large)
1 green onion
1 cup bite-sized tomatoes, halved (grape, cherry, etc.)
1/4 cup chopped pitted kalamata olives
salt and pepper
1 can (4-5 ounces) good-quality oil-packed tuna, drained
Toasted slices of bread (your choice)

Directions:
To make the egg salad, combine the eggs, cottage cheese, 1 tablespoon of the olive oil, the chopped parsley, 1 tablespoon of the lemon juice, capers and green onion (sliced) in a bowl. Mash it all up until it looks like egg salad and season to taste with salt and pepper. Try not to eat it all before you make the salad!

For the salad, mix the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil, the parsley leaves, remaining 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, tomatoes and olives in another bowl and season to taste with salt and pepper. Carefully mix in the tuna (keep some big chunks -- don't try to make tuna salad).

Spread egg salad on slices of toasted bread and top with a bit of the salad mixture.