This is a recipe my mother used as far back as I can remember, only her ingredients were in smaller proportions (3/4 cup sugar, 2 1/2 tbsp cornstarch, 3/4 cup boiling water, 2 1/2 tbsp butter, 3/4 tsp vanilla, and for the chocolate, she used 5 1/4 tbsp cocoa). It always came out dark and delicious and more like a semi-sweet rather than very sweet chocolate taste. It was great on devil's food cake. Better yet with cherry pie filling in between the layers!

I found this recipe in my mother's Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook 70 years ago. Only I found it made the most delicious Hot Fudge Sundae sauce EVER! My kids grew up with it. And, even though the kids are grown, I'm in my 80's, don't eat hot fudge sundaes anymore, and long ago lost the recipe.

This is the recipe in the original Tollhouse Cookbook of Ruth Wakefield used, at the Tollhouse Restaurant in Whitman, Mass., for the "frosting" on Boston Cream Pie.