Have ready a 9 inch deep dish baked pie crust.

In a 2 saucepan, mix sugar, cornstarch and salt. Gradually stir in milk until well blended. Add egg yolks and stir until fully blended, then add chocolate chips. Set over medium heat.

Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture starts to thicken. Keep stirring to avoid lumps. Remove from heat just as it starts to thicken and beat in cream cheese with wire whisk until smooth. Cover surface with plastic wrap and let cool for 1 hour. Original version says to refrigerate, but I've been letting it cool at room temperature.

In a large bowl with an electric mixer, beat whipping cream and vanilla on high speed until soft peaks form. Reserve 1 cup (or 2 cups if using the higher amount of cream) of the whipped cream for topping. Before you set it aside, you can sweeten it to taste with a tablespoon or so of powdered sugar or leave unsweetened.

Fold remaining whipped cream into cooled chocolate mixture and spoon evenly into cooled baked shell.

Refrigerate 6 to 8 hours or overnight. Spoon or pipe reserved whipped cream over filling. Store in refrigerator or freeze.