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This salmon nicoise salad makes a healthy and impressive meal that packs into an easy, satisfying lunch.

How to Make Nicoise Salad

The original Nicoise salad is very basic with capers, anchovies, hard-boiled eggs, olive, and tomatoes. While it’s delicious, it’s not exactly a kid-friendly meal so I swapped the anchovies and capers with baked salmon, added steamed green beans, roasted potatoes, and voila! A healthy lunch for the office or school lunch bag.

image: salmon salad in a lunchbox with carrots, olives, green beans and tomatoes. Other portions of the lunch container filled with fruit and popcorn.

If you’re wondering where I got the salmon from, it’s leftovers from a previous dinner of baked salmon, green beans, and potatoes. I do that a lot around here, especially in our family meal plans. Why start from scratch every day, when you can score two meals with one?

If you want to make more fresh meals for your family but need a little boost, check out the Family KickStart Program. It provides healthy recipes as well as a completed shopping list, prep tips and a meal map, to make life easy. And did I mention, it provides everything you need to eat clean as a family for the next 30 days? Because it totally does. Get more info here.

Back to the salad, if salmon is a no-go for your family you can use canned tuna, an extra hard-boiled egg, or even grilled chicken strips. Although we are changing up the traditional salad nicoise, it’s concept is still the same; simple, fresh, and good for you.

Best Nicoise Salad Dressing

I’ve included a simple vinaigrette dressing in the recipe, partly because all the ingredients are probably in your fridge and pantry but mostly because it’s the best type of salad dressing to toss into a nicoise salad.

The vinaigrette takes less than 2 minutes to make and it brings out all the flavors of the salad ingredients, definitely worth giving it a go.

Keeping Nicoise Salad Fresh

To prolong the freshness of this salad, keep it refrigerated and save the dressing until right before serving.

If you’re making this for a school lunch be sure to pack the vinaigrette in sauce containers and include it in the lunch bag, along with a freezer pack, so everything stays nice and fresh.

How to Pack Nicoise Salad for Lunch

It works the same as the dinner version, all the ingredients are arranged over a bed of lettuce, though this time you’ll be assembling it in lunch containers. Top the lettuce with salmon, veggies, tomatoes, olives, and pack the dressing in a sauce container. It makes this salad and an easy choice for the lunchbox.

Best Lunch Salads

Salads are a great swap from the usual sandwiches and like this salmon Nicoise, they can be made to pack a variety of nutrient-dense ingredients. If you want more healthy salad ideas for lunch you’ll love these salads, each are quick to assemble and add variety to the lunchbox:

Tell me what you think? Is salad nicoise going to be a new lunch go-to for you?