Dark Chocolate Sauce

This is a delicious sauce. The recipe comes from Penzey's Spice House. And that would be my recommendation as a source for the cocoa powder and vanilla. http://www.penzeys.com/


You can use this sauce for a variety of desserts. It is great as a dip for strawberries and cherries. Emillio's Tapas Bar in Chicago creates a dessert consisting of creampuff shells cut and filled with scoops of vanilla ice cream and covered with the sauce.

Dark Chocolate Sauce
1 Cup Cocoa (Get the cocoa from Penzey’s Spice House. I use the natural rather than the Dutch Process for most my recipes. The natural has more bite. The Dutch Process has a smoother taste.)
1.25 Cups Sugar
0.5 Cup Hot Water minus a Tablespoon or Two
0.5 Cup Half & Half minus a Tablespoon or Two
Pinch Salt
1 Teaspoon Double Strength Madagascar Vanilla

In a small heavy saucepan, blend cocoa with sugar. Stir in hot water and mix until smooth. Add half & half and salt. Heat to boiling; cook for 2 minutes. Wait till cool, and then stir in vanilla. Makes 2 cups of sauce.

Donna's Potato Salad

From Donna Michels, "The potato salad recipe as I have it written from forty years ago.' 

Dressing: Makes one cup. Beat or shake in a jar: 1/4 cup vinegar (or less, see notes) 3/4 cup oil 1TBs. sugar 1/4 tsp. pepper 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. dry mustard 1 tsp. paprika clove of garlic Refrigerate. Shake often. Make a day ahead to give flavors chance to blend. 

Mix together cut, boiled potatoes (Cook in jackets till just pierceable.) Peel and add dressing while still warm. Mix in hard-boiled eggs, chopped celery, green onion. Refrigerate. When cooled, add Hellman's mayonnaise. Sprinkle with celery seed. 

NOTES: Oil: I obviously wasn't using olive oil when I first made this, or I wouldn't have refrigerated the dressing. Now I always use olive oil, leave the jar on the counter, and shake every time I walk by. Garlic: Originally, you just left the clove whole and took it out before mixing. But that wasn't enough garlic for me. Now I put a small clove through the press and hope it will disintegrate. Another reason to make early and shake often. Vinegar: I can't use this much of a sharp wine vinegar. I put in a couple TBs. at a time and taste. Sometimes I have even used Balsamic. Potatoes: About five pounds works with this amount of dressing, which seems oily at first, but gets completely absorbed. I use red potatoes ( whatever local grower I can find, not the tasteless name-brand ones) and don't remember ever boiling them. I steam them in the spaghetti cooker and always add a bay leaf to the water. Eggs: I put these in when the salad is the main dish, topped with feta and tomatoes and Kalamatas, a la Tarpon Springs. Onion: I was surprised to see that the recipe called for scallions. I always use either Vadalias or shallots. I guess it's a matter of taste. Which the whole recipe seems to be anyway. Celery Seed: I forgot to put this in when I made it for you guys. Mayo: This recipe proves I've been snooty about Hellman's for forty years. Again, I don't know the amount. I just add until it looks comfortable.

-- A note from Marsha Pedersen, 09-14-2022: Donna and I emailed back and forth on this topic. What you’ll note is that the amount of potatoes isn’t specified. We arrived at the conclusion that 2 pounds is too little for the amount of dressing and 3 pounds is too much. I loved one of her comments, that she would set the dressing in a little covered jar on the kitchen counter and give it a shake every time she walked past.

-- Mike Hinko replying to Marsha Pedersen, 09-14-2022: Thanks for narrowing down the amount of potatoes used for this recipe. Very helpful. I remember Donna shaking the dressing jar. I did too. Also, once the dressing was poured over the cooked potatoes we would stir the bowl once in a while. These two things are sometimes overlooked when making the recipe, but they are very important. The dressing ingredients need to mingle and the dressing needs to work its way into the potatoes. Shortcuts don't work. -- MH

-- A note from Mike Hinko, 09-15-2022: If you're interested in how this recipe evolved over the years you can read about it here: https://michaelhinko.blogspot.com/2022/09/potato-salad-evolution-of-recipe.html?m=1