Post a Comment On: Lancaster from the Inn Side

We received a dinner invitation from friends who are local innkeepers at The Smithton Inn in Ephrata. The theme was chocolate. Well, I thought, I’ll just whip up a batch of double chocolate macadamia cookies. Would that be enough for dinner? I certainly could survive for one night on chocolate and wine, but I’m married to a salad lover.

So I thought back to a wonderful dinner I had at Carrs (a great restaurant in downtown Lancaster) – it was part of our Chocolate Tour. Tim had served a unique white chocolate dressing on the salad. I know what you’re thinking – my brain also struggled to marry the tastes, but it was delicious.

And so I set out looking for recipes on the internet. I found plenty, but several called for ingredients that I didn’t have – chocolate extract, walnut oil, raspberry vinegar......and so the search went on. I came upon Recipe Zaar’s Chocolate Balsamic Salad Dressing.

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Recipe Zaar is one of my favorite sites and allows you to adjust the measurements from metric to US and increase the amounts.

Three ingredients meant that the one hour I had to dress, make a salad, greet guests at the inn, and drive to the party should be plenty of time.

I changed the salad to include the ingredients I had on hand: red leaf and romaine lettuce, grape tomatoes, shaved asiago cheese, toasted almonds and vanilla poached pears. To be honest, I think greens with a little more bite would complement the dressing better, but I had to work with what was in my pantry.

It’s best to serve this dressing slightly warm – a lesson I learned on a cold night when it began to congeal! A slight reheat did the trick. You also shouldn’t refrigerate this dressing.
[Image]Everyone loved it, and the salad was a nice complement to the mole chicken and Cincinnati chili that were also on the menu. Oh, yes, I took the cookies too – just in case the other three desserts wouldn’t be enough – after all, you just can’t have too much chocolate for dinner.

So the next time you are looking for something unusual, try my newest salad and dressing combination. Sorry I don't have any pictures of the salad....we ate it!
Chocolate Balsamic Dressing (Serves 14)

1 1/3 cups Balsamic Vinegar
10 5/8 ounces sugar
3 squares dark chocolate

Melt over low heat and stir occasionally. Serve warm.