Shrimp Nicoise Salad

I meant to be blogging about this yesterday. Yesterday was house-cleaning day. The kind of house-cleaning you only do once every 6 weeks or so. You know, more than the perfunctory cleaning, but less than quarterly cleaning. For me, this includes polishing my stainless steel appliances. I recently ran out of my favorite polish, and was forced to try a competitors brand. To say that it didn't live up to my expectations would be an understatement. I had been buffing my fridge for an hour (an outrageous amount of time to be buffing the damn fridge). I was furious and dripping in sweat, trying to buff the streaks out of the fridge. No matter what I did, the streaks would not budge. My temper steadily began to rise at an exponential rate.

I have a temper.  A crazy, mean, boisterous temper. It was out-of-control when I was a kid, but I've learned to remain calm in most situations. Yesterday was not "most situations", as it turned out. I had a full-fledged temper tantrum- stomping my feet, eyes bulging, face tomato-red, spittle flying extraneously.  It was not pretty, I'm so glad I was home alone. I was beyond incensed . My fridge looked better before I decided to clean it. I should have just left it alone. As any extreme outburst of emotion will do, I immediately felt better upon calming down. Not calm enough to sit down and type without throwing the computer at the wall, mind you, but calmer.

So that was yesterday, and of course, I'm sitting here thinking about how childish I acted. So my fridge has some smudges until I receive my old polish (which I feverishly ordered 3 bottles of!) from Amazon. Big deal. I'll live. As for this salad, perhaps I should have made this last night to calm me down. Shrimp and potatoes are two of my favorite comfort foods. Without further ado, here's how to make this delicious, traditionally French salad-

Ingredients (serves 2):

4 tbsp olive oil, divided
6 small red potatoes, quartered
salt and pepper
15-20 haricot verts
16 large shrimp, peeled
1 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp anchovy paste
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp dijon mustard
4 cups romaine lettuce, chopped
2 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and chopped
1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup kalamata olives, halved

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400º. Spray a cookie sheet with cooking spray.
2. Combine 1 tbsp oil, potatoes, and salt and pepper to taste in a bowl. Toss to combine. Place potatoes in a single layer on cookie sheet. Roast in oven 20-25 minutes, or until potatoes are tender and browned. Set aside.
3. Bring a pot of water to boil. Place haricot verts in boiling water, cook for 1 minute.  Drain beans, then plunge into a ice bath. Swirl the beans around, remove from water when cool. Set aside.
4. Preheat grill to high heat. Season shrimp with salt and pepper, then thread shrimp on skewers. Turn grill down to medium-low heat. Grill shrimp 1 minute on each side, remove from heat. Set skewers aside.
5. In a small bowl, combine 3 tbsp olive oil with vinegar, anchovy paste, garlic, and mustard. Whisk thoroughly to emulsify.
6. On a plate, combine 2 cups lettuce, 1 hard-boiled egg, 1/4 cup cherry tomatoes, 1/8 cup kalamata olives, 1 skewer of shrimp, and half of potatoes and beans. Drizzle with oil dressing, serve immediately.

Recipe courtesy of Bev Cooks