When I was a kid, we used to make Toll House Cookies, but with a variation of the recipe that was then on the back of each package of Toll House chocolate chips. I was never able to find that recipe, but this is a close reconstruction.
Preheat oven to 375°F.
Combine softened butter, sugars, salt, and vanilla in bowl. Stir until creamy. Add the baking soda solution near the end of the stirring (I've never been sure why it is a solution?).
Add the eggs, and stir until mixed.
Now layer a cup of flour, sifted; the chocolate; another cup of flour, sifted; the nuts; and the last cup of flour. Stir all this until you can't see the flour any more.
Get a bunch on a teaspoon and drop onto un-greased baking sheets. And by teaspoon, I mean a big heaping teaspoon – the goal is to make big thick cookies – thicker than any normal chocolate chip cookie you've had in the past. I could get about 15 on the large cookie sheet and 12 on the smaller insulated sheet.
Bake 14-16 minutes on the un-insulated sheet on the middle shelf, and 2 minutes longer for the insulated sheet on the lower shelf. The goal here is to get them brown all over and on the bottom, and have them look cake-like and not moist when you break them in half.