DIY

I finally managed to construct my last part of flat pack furniture. It took a little ingenuity on my part but hey I now have a table!

Who would have thought that high heels and a teaspoon would have such uses?

Baseball night

As I think most people know, Baseball is one of america's national sports and like the other national sports, unless someone is explaining what is happening to you it's a little confusing. Luckily at my first baseball event I was surrounded by ex-little league players that could give me the low down on what was going on!

It was a corporate sponsored event for the interns so there was food and alcohol on the company. This allowed me to drink more Bud Light and eat hot dogs!  Although I was informed that monkey nuts were the really food to eat at a baseball match. Just open them up and throw those shells on the ground! 

I'm not going to try and explain the game to you guys as I'm still not sure I followed it but it's kinda like rounders but with cricket terminology throw in! All I know is it went on for ages, in fact I didn't even stay to the end but that's another story, for another time.  As a social event it was great as you could still be involved in the game even if you were chatting about what not. 

As part of out ticket we also got $15 to spend in the gift shop. Sadly that didn't buy you much (got myself some sparkly earrings!) but it did give me the chance to try on this awesome hat...

Remember, everything is bigger in Texas!

Christening my oven

I just finished off the last of my brownies that I made earlier in the week and they were so yummy I thought I would harp back to the roots of this blog and talk about my baking!

After searching around for my baking equpiment (most bought from Walmart) and resiting buying a Kitchen Aid (only $300, this temptation is going to be hard to resist) I stumbled across, what I am now calling, Craft Mecca!  Michael's is a craft superstore that literally sells anything you can think of craft related.  Its incredible and puts Hobbycraft to shame.  I held back on my purchasing as was not sure about how good my oven would be and if I would be able to find the correct ingredients, as I like to hone my skills in the dairy and gluten free baking while I am here.  Luckily Central Market came to the rescue when it came to the ingredients and the oven is amazing, even has a light in there.  Such luxuries I do not have back in the UK, the door to our oven doesn't even stay open!

I assembled the ingredients and start to make my go-to easy bake dark chocolate brownies.

Ingredients and equipment out on my counter 

Dark Chocolate Brownies (recipe adapted from BBC good food)

Ingredients

375g Dark Chocolate

375g Soya based spread

6 large eggs

500g soft brown sugar

225g Plain gluten free flour

Method

Pre heat your oven (180C) and grease a brownie tray (not sure of the size of my tray as do not have a ruler in my flat!).  Melt the chocolate and butter together.  Can use either a bowl over water or the microwave.  I used just a saucepan on a low heat on the hob.  Leave to cool a little.

Mmmmm melted chocolate

In a large bowl, using an electric whisk, whisk together the sugar and eggs until pale in colour and a few air bubbles form.  Add the cooled chocolate and whisk some more.  Then fold in the flour, if you can sieve before adding the flour but as long as there isn't any lumps you should be fine.  Pour into the pan and then pop into the oven for about 35-40 minutes.

Finished product!

 Cut into pieces once it has cooled a little and then stuff your face!

Chasing my tail

As probably everyone who reads this knows, I'm pretty crap at keeping in contact and I really wanted to try with the blog to keep you all up to date with the comes and goings in Houston.  At the moment I feel like I need to do a little chasing my tail to keep you up to date on whats occurring this side of the pond.

Once Vicky left, sob sob, I have spent some time getting the flat up together and I almost have everything now!

My last trip to Walmart for those essentials like a hoover and a table (which is still in pieces on my front room floor as I do not have a screw driver!)

This weekend I caught up with an old friend Meghan and her boyfriend.  I knew her from my days studying in Denmark and it was odd to think the last time we saw each other was about 7 years ago.  We indulged in some local beers and some random Rock'n'Roll karaoke to top off the night.  Sunday was spend remembering that I cannot really drink the same amount I could do 7 years ago without feeling the effects pretty hard the next day!  My salvation was watching the series Once Upon A Time....awesome!

Work has continued to be quite intense, with the middle of my first projects fast approaching I am feeling the stress.  But this stress is something quite different from PhD stress.  Once I can work out the finer details as to why that is, I might blog about it! I did my first presentation to some of the other researchers in the lab and I actually felt it didn't go too badly (my fear of public speaking I think is pretty well known!).  Hopefully with all the practice I will be getting I will get better at it!

I have met some more interns and we have our first Unofficial happy hour tomorrow night, which should be fun.  Then on Friday I have a ticket to watch the Baseball which will be awesome- Vicky I can finally find out what a corndog is for you!  Also went to see This is the End with one of them last night, very amusing comedy and I would recommend it.  I think its more of an American humour thing (there was so much laughing in it) but I did enjoy certain parts of it a lot more than I thought I would.

Also, I have recently blogged for betweenarock and if you don't read that blog...mmm why not?! Head over there now and enjoy some science blogging joy. And to top it all off I christened my oven with its first baked product tonight, once I've tried it I will put a little bit about it on here.

Finally, my sister Vicky (yep there are two special ladies in my life called Vicky) sent me my birthday present early...she knows me so well. :)

TARDIS fairy lights....how amazing!

Done! Think you are all caught up.  Maybe at the weekend I will get the chance to tell you about my brownies and what it is like to go to a baseball game, watch this space!

San Antonio baby!

It seems like a lifetime ago when Vicky and I piled into the car on Friday 5th of July to head down to San Antonio, just 200 miles down the road!  To start off our road trip in true American style we got ourselves a drive-thru Starbucks and I visited a drive-thru ATM machine, oh yeah in Texas you don't even need to leave your car to do your banking these days.

To illustrate the two closest cities to Houston are hundreds of miles away!

We loaded up on snacks and Vicky got on the stereo and sorted out the party tunes and we were on our way.  There is very little to see when you are on the highway between two major cities, if it were for the amazing singalong classics that were pumping out the speakers and the sheer volume of caffeine I had consumed I am sure I would have fallen asleep (just a joke!).

Snacking on sweets during the road trip!

  Once we arrived in San Antonio we headed out for some food along the famous River Walk.  The San Antonio river cuts through the city and along part of the river they have developed it into a tourist haven!  There are tonnes of bars and restaurants and you can even take a boat tour down the river (which we did!).  It is very beautiful however, absolutely PACKED (probably as it was 4th July weekend)!  We went to one restaurant and it had a 2 hour wait!  Finally we found an establishment called the Iron Cactus which sold Mexican food and Margaritas and  had a fairly pleasant dinner which was then topped off by a truly unique boat tour of the River Walk area with an incredibly strange tour guide.  I know nothing more about the city than I did before I got on the boat, however I do know a lot about the etiquette of driving a boat tour.

View from the River Walk tour, who needs to know about the city when its just so truly beautiful

The next day we headed off early to the Alamo, for which San Antonio is famous for.  I have to admit, much like the Declaration of Independence, I had no idea about the Alamo's historical significance.  From what I can gather, mostly from a great dramatisation from the US History Channel which was played in the visitor centre, this was where a pivotal 13 day fight was lost by the Texans when they were trying to claim Independence from the Mexicans (eventually they got there).  It was a really beautiful old building and I'm glad we got there early as the crowds drew in quickly around 11am.

Vicky outside the Alamo

After the Alamo, Vicky had found a flyer for a ranch themed park just 30 minutes northwest of the city and we decided that this was the best way to spend the afternoon, and we surely were not wrong.  It was AMAZING! Enchanted Springs is pretty hard to explain this place, I have linked to their website but I feel it just doesn't do the place justice.  We arrived to be greeted by the sheriff who informs us that in the salon we would find Pistol Packing Paula doing her show.  Oh my what a show it was, if you are bored to check her out on YouTube, this lady was even on America's got Talent.  Later on she let us hold her guns and man they were heavy!

Us with Pistol Packing Paula.  Oh yeah and Vicky got her proper cowgirl on with a new accessory!

The remainder of the day included a really staged, yet amazing, stunt show, a tractor drive around the farm to see the exotic animals and wondering around this incredible place.

Some of the buildings from the Enchanted Spring's Ranch, top left is the Church (where actual weddings are preformed), top right is the Sheriffs office and the bottom picture is the salon bar.

To end off the trip at the ranch we took the bull quite literally by the horns!  Naturally this got us in the mood for some steak so headed back to San Antonio on a mission for meat!

4th of July: A truly American day

For Vicky and I the 4th of July started off with a lie-in.  I'm still trying to get used to getting into work early; most employees are there for 7-7.30am.  And also we had been having a few late nights doing with the gradual moving in process.  The lie-in was blissful.  Once up and about we started upon our celebrations of this national holiday in the only way we could think appropriate: by dressing in red, white and blue!  The first stop on our itinerary was the Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens.  They were holding a reading of the declaration of independance in the afternoon which included birthday cake. That definitely grabbed our attention! 

Beautiful old house

The location was beautiful, with a lovely  large house with a collection of furntiure and art from different periods of american history nessles in some wonderfully calming gardens. 

I wonder if any of them had been to Band Camp?

As we arrived we noticed some gentlemen sweating happily as they played a marching song on their whistles and drums. Impressed by the sheer level of dedication to re-enacting we wondered what else this place had in store for us. Well after passing a lady dressed as the state of liberty and a giant copy of the declaration of independance (we signed it!) I thought that would be it. But no I was wrong, around the next corner was more people dressed in period clothing and depicting different players in the war of independance. From the photo you can see that the red coat (English solider who wasn't doing the accent sadly) probably had one of he hottest outfits, why a furry bag is necessary I'm not sure but it made me kinda want one!

Heavy duty uniforms are very practical in nearly 40C heat

At 3pm another man in custome read the declaration of independance and also explained what it was. I may sound pretty native but up until that point I didn't really know that it started the war of Independance not ended it.  Poor men had to keep fight for years in those sweaty uniforms before they got their independance!  After the reading, which was surprisingly long, cake was served.

Vicky and I then headed off to Party City to find some more red white and blue things to wear for our evenings entertainment Freedom over Texas, a large concert and fireworks display.

Mmmmm America, fun how your flag has the same colours on it as the United Kingdom's flag.

After some confusion on whether or not we could take in our cooler full of beer (we couldn't) we took our seats to listen to the end of the concert (Sheryl Crow) and watch the fireworks while dressed head to toe in red white and blue and drinking a bud light. Felt pretty American right then and there!

I am connected!

After a long and tedious conversation with yet another service company, I finally have wi-fi at home.  I can not express how brilliant this feels to finally be connected without have to walk to another part of the building to steal free wifi or pop into the computer suite (yes this apartment complex has a computer suite, along with a gym and a number of swimming pools).  So I thought I would catch you guys up on what has been going down since I last blogged.

Basically LOTS has happened so to make it easier for you guys I thought I would split it up into separate blogs so you can pick and choose what you read about.  The selection I have for your reading pleasure is as follows:

• 4th of July
• Central market
• Tour of the empty flat

To give you all an insight into what is happening right this moment.  I am sat on the balcony of my flat, in a camp chair watching the sun set over the building opposite, eating sushi for dinner and drinking a nice big Gin and bitter lemon...bliss!

To follow at the weekend is the 411 on what Vicky and I got up to in San Antonio, was pretty cool to say the least.

Tour of an empty flat

It seems that furnished flats are few and far between in the Houston area.  This causes a slight issue for us expats new to town with no furniture of our own.  Its not a major deal as there is a conveniently located Ikea in the vicinity.

This billboard amused me greatly at the time.  Bloody Ikea always up in my grill!

But it does give me the opportunity to show you the flat before I mess it up with my general laziness and untidiness!  Here is a quite video to show you my huge, yet on USA scale its pretty small, flat which I will be calling home over the next few months.

Once I have all my furniture and the flat is tidy maybe I will give you another tour at a later date.  With my minimal approach to furniture it really highlights the sheer size of the rooms!

Central market: a love affair

Supermarket shopping isn't fun. Let's face it, it's one of those chores that just have to do, like taking out the bins. Magically, this changed when your in a new country. It happened when I was on holiday in Germany- never has Lidls been so exciting- and it's happened here too.  Walmart was overwhelming, Randells was efficient but Central Market is awesome!

It was described to me by my realtor as a place where "you could eat your way around the world". I'm not sure if that's strictly true but there is definitely a LOT of choice.

Meat anyone?

The selection of serve yourself coffee beans

Cwaaafffeeee

Part of the beer selction

And the best part of it is there are tonnes of free tasters including coffee, which is definitely needed if you shop on a Sunday afternoon along with the rest of Houston (rooky mistake!).

Since my initial trip there I've been pretty much every other day for something "essential" such as okra or sushi for dinner. And for the next few months I do not see this love affair turning sour!

Mid week mini blog

Just to give you all an update on life state side. Vicky arrived on Sunday and it's been so good having someone here to share some of this with. She had been managing my stress and incompetence at adult life very well-some may call her a god send! Now in new flat officially but no wifi as of yet. Have a bed and futon (for guests...come on over!) and dishes but yet to buy baking equipment (but have a bender for margaritas- got my priorities straight). Work has been intense, lots of meeting. Some of which I know what's going on and others there are so many acronyms that it's like everyone is talking another language!

Tomorrow is 4th of July and I think it might get a little messy! Will give you updates next week. At the weekend we are road tripping to San Antonio to go to the Alamo and other American tourist treats, watch this space!

Sweat update

It hit over 40C I was informed yesterday. I was running about Houston searching out furniture for my new place and ended up having quite a heated discussion with my bank on the phone when my debit card was rejected at Ikea (all is well people so no nee to worry, Ikea just doesn't like debit cards!).  So whilst sat in the car as I was not driving the air con was struggling to cool the car and at one point sweat was dripping off my eyelids. Outside was slightly cooler than the car but I would go with sweaty eyelids as this weeks sweat update. Bring on July!

Office policies for one?

The last fews day have been so exhausting I have not had much time to reflect on and account the actual experience.

As you can gather from my last post, I started work on Wednesday.  I popped on my best (only) suit and drove in early in the morning. Rush hour traffic is something to behold here. But I'm accompanied in the traffic by over enthusiastic radio DJs and a cheesy pop music with a splattering of country, oh I can't wait to get an aux cable! Upon reaching work and managing to park (more about my incompetence at parking later).

I started a day that most consisted of admin and health and safety briefings. For someone who hasn't had a real job in a long time, it was exhausting. With regards to the work and other related thibg, there is little I'm allowed to say due to contracts and confidentiality so I'll leave out all the boring geology details from the blog (I bet most of you are glad about that!).

There is one thing I think I'm allowed to mention is that I have an office to myself. That's right...no sharing! This is very strange to me as I have never at work or at university been in an office to myself. And it's an odd experience. There is no one to talk to, no noise (well that's not strictly true as I leave the door open), and lots of space! Still don't really know what to make of having an office to myself but I think it could be good, better not get to used to it as I know I'll be returning to G44 before I know it!

Don't dream it...see it!

Since I was introduced to the Rocky Horror Picture show by a friend in my early teens I have always enjoyed watching the film, singing the songs and doing the time wrap.  But I had never seen it in the cinema nor the theatre. I have always wanted to but never had the chance, until now. It seems that one of the local art cinemas plays it every 2 weeks over the summer, how amazing that the cult following is so large in Houston that they show it that often!

The red lips were a MUST for Rocky.  Sadly, I didnt dress up...*hangs my head in shame*

I managed to persuade a few friends to come along to the showing with me. Two of these people had no idea of what they were in for but I thought hey could cope with the oddness that would ensue, luckily I was right. There was a shadow cast (who mime to the film and act out what is going on) and there was a huge amount of audience participaaaaaaaation! 

It was so much fun that I might even try and go back another time this summer.

Arguing with Sean

Who is Sean, I hear you all ask.  Well Sean is the irish male voice on my tomtom app and we don't really get on! I've never driven with a sat nav before and I can't say I'm enjoying the experience thus far. 

Initially I had a few teething problems with actually getting the app to actually work but I think that is more my inaptuded with my new iPhone than anything else. Now I've got him running and there has been mixed success. I don't like driving at the best of times let alone in a forgien car on the other side of the road in heavy relentless traffic where the majority of the drivers don't indicate and/or are on their phones. It's so bloody dangerous.

Anyway, back to mine and Sean's adventures on the road. So he has a tendency to want me to go on the large ring roads and interstates which for those who have not been to the USA are large motorway style roads which are often much larger (went on one yesterday with 7 lines in either direction). Up until yesterday I have been resisting this as they scare the bejesus out of me. So everytime we head towards one I start screaming at Sean in the car asking him what he thinks he is doing (but in more colourful language). Obviously I get no reply. Once we are on the larger roads he is not help with lane choices as the next instruction is slow to be given which has lead to quick and quite scary changes between lanes. It's a real adrenaline ride that's for sure.

The frustrations don't just head in one direction, am sure if Sean were human and could feel emotion he would be exastabated by my sheer lack of distance awareness! I do not know how far 400yards are and to be honest it would not help if it were in metres. I just have a mental blank at distances. This has lead to me turning way before my alloted direction from Sean. This causes him to furiously recalculate and me to keep asking him where we are going, again in quite colourful language!

Although our relationship is improving we have a long way to go until it is harmonious!

Tomorrow is the beginning...

After waiting around, biding my time with important stuff (house hunting and eating cupcakes both constitute important stuff!), tomorrow I start work officially.  I'm very excited and yet quite nervous at the same time as its been a long time such I have worked and even longer since I have started somewhere new.  Bristol University has been my home for so long, I know the corridors (and dread the social awkwardness they bring) and people pretty well.  Now it's a whole new set of people and corridors but hopefully less social awkwardness!  Who knows what my new "office policies" maybe?!

Today I had a quick lunch in the cafetiere at the offices and managed to see some friendly faces of people I have met from the company over the years.  It set my mind at ease a little and it was just good to feel like I already knew some people.  However, I did have a tour of some of the offices and saw the endless corridors. As I am not known for my sense of direction feel like I might get quite lost.

Oh well, better run off now and sort out the deposit for my apartment and sort out my sewing up my work skirt (it got ripped) and get myself prepared for tomorrow-Wish me luck!

Cupcake delight

I've managed to walk about the supermarkets here and so far being very health. Lots of fruit and veg and no diary or gluten, very healthy.

Check out my mini aubergines!

But I knew this wouldn't last. With so much temptation everywhere I had to cave. And what better way to cave then with a cupcake. So with this in mind I went on the hunt, and found a peanut butter chocolate cupcake with a mini Reece's cup on the top. For those who know me well they know I LOVE Reece's cups so knew this was the cake for me.

It was worth breaking my good behaviour for. Tonnes of icing and lovely crumb (thank you Mary Berry for teaching me the joy of saying something had a lovely crumb). I will leave you with this image, it's enough to make your mouth water!

House hunting

Most of Saturday afternoon (with an encore on Monday afternoon) was spent looking for an apartment (not a flat, its an apartment, you get funny looks when you say flat over here).  I didn't think this would be particular hard but I was wrong.  It wasn't that hard just very fast paced and a bit like being trapped in a some sort of twlight zone where everything looked eerily similar.

The apartment blocks I was looking at were in various locations near and far from my soon-to-be office and although very beautiful far from being uniquely designed.  I looked at three and to be honest I don't think I could tell one from the other in the end.  The experience was the same at each location and went a bit like this.  In the entrance we (I had a Realtor with me guiding me through the processes which I'm very grateful for because otherwise I would have been totally lost) were greeted by a well made up young lady with a wonderful smile and sunny disposition, eager to show us around the beautiful and classy apartment block.  Some searching ensued on the computer system to find me an apartment for a short term lease, this proved difficult but not impossible as I was told repeatedly.  The floor plans were shown of studio and one bedroom apartments and square footage was discussed at length.  "Ms Cooper, is 750 sq. ft going to be enough room for you?" to which my response was always "I think so" with a look of total confusion.  Who knows what a square foot is- I'm from the metric generation, work in metres and then you will get a proper response smiley woman!

Then the tour of the apartment block began.  Gym, games room and lounge were all lovely and beautifully finished (a word I have never heard so much in my life until this experience).  Then to the pool areas, and this is where the beautiful people resided.  It was like a snap shot from a American tv show set in LA or somewhere equally as warm.  People using the grill (not BBQ, this things are far superior to our BBQs back in the UK), drinking iced tea, throwing the ball about in the pool and generally have a jolly good time.

I would show you some images from the apartments themselves but I am sure it would be an infringement of copyright or something so I thought I would wait until I moved into one and then bombard you with photos.  Needless to say, the finish was beautiful and for those who can either do maths or already know how big 750sq. ft is, its bloody huge!  Not sure what I am going to do with all the space as the walking in closet (oh yeah) is nearly as big as my kitchen at home.

After deciding on a location, Monday afternoon was spent trying to secure the apartment.  The one I really wanted was signed for no more than 10 minutes after I told them I was interested, damn them.  But never fear, I signed for another flat in another building in the end.  This process involved getting a money order, which is like a postal order, from a pharmacy.  This alone was a strange experience.  A lady named Fallon served me and just kept telling me she loved foreign money it reminded her of monopoly money. Hate to rock this girls world but...

So after all this, I now move into my new pad on Saturday and get to hang out with the beautiful people in the wonderfully finished apartment block.

How to deal with jet leg? Go to the Mall!

Luckily with most of my trips away they have either been so full on in the first few days or so short that I have never really had much of an issue with jet lag on the out going leg of the journey.  However, despite the busy Saturday afternoon things have been relatively slow paced, which is good as it was manic before I left.  However, this has made adjusting to the correct time zone more tricky than normal.  Waking up early is destroying me for anytime after 5pm!

To battle this, I decided to take advantage of the location of my new "home" and have a trip the the Mall!

The front of the mall

Well, it was definitely stimulating if not a little over stimulating.  The place is HUGE and there were so many people.  The oddest thing about the trip was that there were young girls wearing large my-fat-gypsy-wedding style dresses walking around being followed by a group of young boys wearing suits with waistcoats of a matching colour.  It was odd...but it did manage to keep me awake until the late hour of 9pm.  One step at a time...

I love g-o-o-o-ld! The look of it! The smell of it! The way it drives!

Picked up my hire car for the next few months.  I'm so scared about driving in a big city but this car is going to make everything better because it is G-o-o-old! and I love it! Well strictly speaking it is metallic brown but to me it looks GOLD so that is what I am sticking with.  Check her out, isnt she a beauty!

I promise it's gold not silver like it looks in the picture

Strange thing happened when I picked it up.  I turned on the radio and it was playing the theme from the Neverending Story.  Singing along to that whilst driving on the wrong side of the car on the wrong side of the road was a pretty surreal experience.

A short stint at being Alan Partridge

The hotel I am staying in is not quite the same as the Holiday Inn that the wonderful Alan lived in, thank heavens. Although the receptionist did refer to it as my new home (I'm staying here until I have managed to get an permanent residence sorted out) which creeped me out a little.  The rooms in the hotel are self catering  but a standard all american breakfast is included (which I have been going to town on in the mornings).  This means there is a little kitchen/dining room area as well as a bedroom and bathroom.  Its really nice, but don't take my word for it, have a little look at the front room, bedroom is already to messy to show you!

My front room and kitchen unit

I promise I'm not listening to the Black Beauty theme tune that much!

Business class, don't mind if I do!

Transatlantic flights is something I have kind of got used to over the years since I started my PhD.  In total I have been on 8 such flights in 4 years, that is a lot of time sitting down.  But never had I ever been anywhere other than cattle class, which is probably the best place for me when I am travelling in stinky field clothes and walking boots!

This time it was different, oh so very different.  I was flying Business Class. You know those seats that you always walk past when you get on the plane which look like little pods.  Oh it was amazing, but I will get onto the plane experience in a moment.  First I will try and describe amusement of the airport and the feeling of not belonging.

So when I arrived at the airport I had to use a real person to do the check in procedure instead of an automated machine.  As she checked me in she noted "You know you are in Business Class right?" but from examining her face I could tell she was thinking "How are you in Business Class?!?!".  I was not dressed in a suit, I had holes in my leggings and a "cool" (Rob thinks its stupid) hat on.  Definitely not the normal attire for a Business Class traveller.  In fact, I stood out so much that I was asked on four separate occasions to show my boarding pass to see if I was meant to be there.  Then I made my way to the Lounge area.

The lounge

Free food, drink (alcoholic), free newspapers, free wifi and a whole lot of comfort.  There were huge sofas where you could lie out on, a great view of the airport and london.  To be honest, it was pretty cool.  I think I mostly was walking around with my mouth open or stuffing it with food.  It was great.  The free food/drink continued on the plane with a glass of champagne before we set off!

Champagne before take-off

The seats were like futuristic pods where everything was controlled by buttons and there were secret compartments.  Well, it was more like the futuristic idea people had in the 1970s and popped into Sci-Fi movies.  Nevertheless it confused me so much that I ended up being signalled by another passenger across the plane about how to put up the divider between the seats. I also couldnt work the foot stool for the first hour of the flight!  But then I managed to get horizontal (oh yeah those seats go fully horizontal) and chill out to some bad movies.

The starter of my lunch

The lunch menu was handed around (yep...menu! There was choice and more free drinks!) along with a vanity kit for the flight (sample sized bottles of expensive face creams and the like).  All in all it was an odd but extremely pleasant trip and despite not sleeping much I was pretty with it the other end, the miracle of Business Class!

Back to blogging!

Hello blogosphere,

At the beginning of the year I had such high hopes with my blogging, but sadly life took over and I stopped talking in a huge amount of detail about my baking online.  Sad times.  But I have been lucky enough to be involved in another AMAZING blog called BetweenARock.  If you have not checked it out here is a link and I urge you to get on there and read some fun things about science and PhD life.  Its been great blogging with these guys, such media moguls!  Through my increased interactions with the world of social media, I have discovered a love for Twitter (shameless plug coming up) and would love it if you wanted to follow me on there are well! @Cooper_KT go on, follow me!

SO...why have I started up blogging on here again?

Well, it is because I am living in Houston, Texas, USA for the next few months and I thought that it would be the best way to keep you all up to date about my adventures.  I will try my hardest to give you the lowdown on how an English girl finds the strange ways of the USA and keep you up to date on the levels of sweating I am reaching (currently, I would say the sweat levels were similar to running up one flight of stairs).  Apart from that there might be the odd cross post about science from BetweenARock and definitely lots of pictures!  I hope you enjoy!

When life gives you lemons, make cake.

Today wasn't the brightest day for my PhD. Nothing totally disastrous that will stop me from ever finishing but one of those days that means I left early and bought a bottle of wine from Waitrose and, of course, some eggs for baking!

I did have a massive craving for lemon polenta cake after a friend mentioned they were making something with polenta on facebook.  But I could not find polenta anywhere on my way home.  Sad times.  This made me want to open the wine whilst walking home, but it started to snow and I thought it might be a little impractical.  Don't want the snow to dilute the wine!

So with my lemons, I decided to bake lemon and almond cupcakes.  Kinda winged it again with the recipe.  The finished product was quite nice, very moist in the middle and super crumbly.  If I were to be eating gluten I think I might have put in a little flour to hold the bad boys together.  I topped them with some blueberry jam (which I made from some blueberries that were heading towards the bin with lemon juice and sugar) and rolled icing.  I had no inspiration for decorating them but then after I did a few random designs I realised that philosophically I had depicted how I feel about my PhD- lots of clocks denoting the running out of time!

Check out the recipe below:

Recipe
(makes 18 large cupcakes)
8oz butter (or dairy free sunflower spread)
8oz caster sugar
4 eggs
9.5oz ground almonds
1 tsp almond essence
2 lemons, both zest and juice
1/2 tsp baking powder
(if non-gluten free then add 1oz of flour)

Pre-heat the oven to 180C and place cupcake cases in the tin.  Cream together the sugar and butter, do this until very pale.  Add eggs whisking well (I almost always split my batter at this point so little bits at a time!).  Then fold in the almond along with the lemons, baking powder and the almond essence (this is when you can add the flour).  Fill the cupcake cases just over 2/3 full as it wont rise much.  Bake for about 18 mins but keep looking at them through the door as mine caught and browned quite well on the top.

Is it a slippery slope? No its a rocky road!

I have a new addiction.  Its gluten and dairy free rocky road.  And having sampled many a glutenous version, I have to say there is very little difference (yipee!)

But then this snowy Friday I can only say that my addiction took a turn for the worse.  I combined a flapjack base with a rocky road (- the biscuit) top. OH MY DAYS, that is definitely the way to get over snow day blues.

And as its one of mine, here is the recipe:

Recipe
Flapjack base
4oz Butter
4oz Dark Brown sugar
3 tbsp Golden Syrup
8oz Oats
Rocky Road topping
2oz Butter
5oz Dark Chocolate
2 tbsp Golden Syrup
2oz Mini Marshmallows
2oz Cherries (optional!)

Flapjack first.  Pre-heat the oven to 180C.  Grease a baking tray, mine is 20cm by 20cm and it gave me quite a shallow flapjack but that is fine as the topping helps add bulk later.  Melt the butter, golden syrup in a sauce pan over a medium heat.  Then add the oats and pour into the tin.  Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes and this should give you a sticky flapjack base.  Leave to cool for a while (15-30 mins) and then get on with the Rocky Road topping.

Melt the butter, golden syrup and chocolate in a pan over a medium heat.  Once melted remove from the heat and leave for a few minutes.  During this time, chop up your cherries.  Then add the marshmallows and cherries to the mixture.  Pour and spread over the top of the flapjack and pop in the fridge to set for a few hours.  Take out of the fridge, cut into squares and stuff your face!

Sadly, there are no photos as I was too busy eating them but here is one of some snow.

Beetroot...mmm

I'm a big fan of vegetables in cakes.  I love a good moist carrot cake and not just for the icing.  A muffin filled with spiced butternut squash is a wonderful with a cup of tea and a fairly recent discovery is has been courgette cake.  But my absolute favourite is chocolate and beetroot...mmmm!

After an unsuccessful and slightly disheartening day in the lab I decided there was no better way to make myself feel brighter than a some lovely chocolate and beetroot brownies.  So I ran off to the big Sainsbury's and picked up the last bunch of raw beetroot and rushed home.

Instead of following a recipe I decided to wing it and I think this had a mixed level of success.  I was aiming for a gluten and dairy free gooey delight, however it was a bit crumbly and sugary but I still enjoyed baking it.  I think next time I might need to add some xanthan gum, cook it for a few minutes less and use less sugar.  Here is the recipe anyway!

Recipe

9oz cooked beetroot (peel, chop, place in a bowl with some water and microwave for 10 minutes)
4.5oz chopped dark chocolate 
1 tsp vanilla essence
180ml sunflower oil
3 eggs
4oz light brown sugar
5oz golden caster sugar
3oz gluten free plain flour
2oz cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder

Pre-heat the oven to 180C and grease a brownie tin.

Blitz the beetroot and chocolate together, as the beetroot is warm it will melt the chocolate and the kitchen will smell amazing.  Then add the oil and vanilla essence.

In a separate bowl whisk the eggs and sugar until it thickens and turns pale.  You should be able to move the whisk around the bowl and it will leave a trail. Then pour in the beetroot mix and fold in.  It looks a bit odd at this point but almost there.  Next sieve in the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and fold together.

Once its completely mixed in, pour it into the tin and cook for 25-35 minutes.  Leave to cool and then cut, hopefully it will be less crumbly than this bad boy was!

I think I will take these in tomorrow and offer then to the analytical machine that isn't working as some sort of ritual peace offering.  Maybe it might start working, who knows!

Red Velvet Cupcakes

The 1st of January should be a time for lie ins, hangover, ridiculously grand and never obtainable resolutions and tidying up from the night before.  However, for one of my lovely friends its time to celebrate some more (hair of the dog all round) as its her BIRTHDAY.  And every birthday needs, not matter which day of the year it is on, a CAKE!  This is always my favourite excuse to bake.

So my wonderful friend is an adventurous old soul and this gives me license to go wild with the cake.  Last year I tried cake pops with a limited amount of success, although I did discover that if you add enough glitter to something it always looks beautiful.  This year I decided that I wanted to do something bold, something bright and something yummy and Red Velvet Cupcakes sprang to mind.  I have never made them before and always wanted to.  They are a pretty stunning cake especially when you use a cream cheese icing.  I used the Hummingbird cake days recipe for these cupcakes and they were really fun to make.

You add so much red colouring, I was quite surprised when I almost run out of food colouring.



And the finished product! Yummy yummy.