Never underestimate the power of chocolate pudding.

Ingredients:

7/8 cup white sugar
2 1/2T corn starch
1/8t salt (ie, a pinch)
2/3 cup Ghirardelli's semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/3 cup Ghirardelli's double chocolate chips
1 square Baker's unsweetened chocolate
1 egg
2 cups milk
2T butter
2t vanilla extract (mexican vanilla, if at all possible)

Directions:
Mix egg and milk in a bowl thoroughly.
In a non-stick pot, combine sugar, corn starch, and salt. and mix thoroughly.
Add milk, egg, chocolate to pot and stir. Note: the sugar will not dissolve (yet).
Apply heat... between medium & medium high.
Bring to a rolling boil, stirring constantly.
Remove from heat. Add butter and vanilla and stir some more.
Serve and eat hot with a biiig glass of milk. Makes 4 very huge servings, or 6 normal servings.

Variations:
*Try Ghirardelli's milk-chocolate instead of double chocolate chips.
*for Vanilla pudding, delete chocolate and increase corn starch to 3T.

Note:
*Quality of vanilla is very important, so get the good stuff. Mexican vanilla is the best, if you happen to know anyone who's been to Mexico lately.
*You might also try adding a pinch of cinnamon (if you're not using Mexican vanilla, that is. We think that might be the secret ingredient of Mexican vanilla, but we're not certain).

Special thanks to Alan Erickson, who taught me his recipe.