We asked Celine O’Donnell, a bilingual walking tour guide who lives in Nice, France if she would select the 2024 Summer menu for Perfectly Provence readers. Celine decided on a collection of her favourite, typical Niçoise recipes – Pissaladière, Truccha, Salade Niçoise and Tourte de Blettes. We hope you enjoy …

Eggs and Swiss chard are the main ingredients in la trucha, a culinary favourite in Nice, France. Like the Spanish tortilla de patatas, made with egg and potato, la trucha covers a range of meals from snack food to picnic fare to a light meal. Easy to prepare and served …

While we often think of soup as a cold-weather dish, some recipes bridge the seasons perfectly. Filled with vegetables and legumes, la soupe au pistou is one such dish. In Nice and traditional Cuisine Nissarde pistou soup is a summer dish. A mix of seasonal vegetables, potatoes and beans cook …

Panisse, like polenta, is easy to make. The difference is chickpea flour instead of cornmeal. However, the culinary debate about whether panisse is a culinary creation of Marseille or Nice continues without resolution. Is the authentic version of panisse found at a snack bar on the beach in l’Estaque, where …

Dishes such as ratatouille, pan bagnat, panisse, soup au pistou, and salade Niçoise appear on menus throughout the South of France. Many cooks have time-tested variations on these recipes, which may be delicious, but don’t quite follow the Cuisine Nissarde traditions. Although ratatouille is known around the globe, the authentic …

Among Nice’s many attractions are its Mediterranean location and the fresh seafood. Octopus (la pouple) is one ingredient that often features in Niçoise dishes. La pouple à la Niçoise was a favourite of the local fisherman mentioned by Tobias Smollett in 1762. However, the recipe has likely evolved since that …

The problem with growing zucchini in your kitchen garden (potager) is that it often ripens all at the same time. When my garden produces more zucchini than I can possibly consume, the problem is what to do with the bounty. Thankfully I remembered trouchia, a favourite dish from Nice, France, …

While panisse and socca include chickpea flour and water, the preparation and cooking for these typical Niçoise recipes are different. Like polenta, panisse starts with a dough cooked until it is thick. Then the dough is rolled or shaped and fried in a hot pan. Panisse is served hot and …

Fève(s) is a French word with several meanings – a trinket in the epiphany cake, chocolate disks used by chocolatiers and in baking, and fava beans. So in this Niçoise dessert recipe, we are talking about fava beans for the tart (tourte) filling, egg, sugar, and hints of citrus. The …

If you like a salad Niçoise, then pan bagnat should be on your list to try. This sandwich is perfect for a lunchtime bite on the go or a picnic and includes many of the same ingredients (tomatoes, olives, tuna, anchovies, and radishes) as the salad inside the centre of …