Baking

It is 3 weeks until I move to Virginia, and I went into a baking frenzy today.  Why? I needed to figure out the best recipe to make m & m cookies.  A few weeks ago, I made the "perfect" m & m cookie by perfect-palate.  Everybody loved them, but there was something not quite right.  I was determined to figure it out.

Today, I re-made the perfect-palate cookies.  Last time, I had to use full-sized m & m's because I couldn't find the mini ones, therefore I used full-sized chocolate chips.  Today, I made them exactly as the recipe called for, using 1 cup of mini m & m's.  I also made Averie's soft m & m chocolate cookies.  I used 2/3 cup mini m & m's and a handful of normal-sized m & m's (a bag of mini m & m's doesn't get you too far these days...).  Additionally, I used 1/2 vanilla pudding mix and 1/2 cornstarch.

Now comes the hard part: which one is best!

First, they look amazing!

http://picky-palate.com/2013/04/03/how-to-make-perfect-m-and-m-cookies/

http://www.averiecooks.com/2014/01/soft-mm-chocolate-chip-cookies.html

Second, they taste great!  It has taken me a few days to decide which of these two cookies I like better...The first cookie is soft and chewy, and the second cookie is even softer.  However, the second cookie I found to be a *just* bit dense for my liking.  Therefore, I believe that the first cookie is better, ONLY if it is made with mini m & m's (that being said, I would make both again in a heart beat).

Until next time!

--Robyn

Time

Hi everyone,

As you can tell, I have not written a blog post in a while.  That is due to having a lot of work and not enough hours in the day.  I am in the middle of my second round of exams/ midterms, thesis, and graduate school applications.  I am feeling overwhelmed and am having troubles expressing my feelings.  However, I am glad that to say I am currently working on my discussion for my thesis and am finding it very exciting.  I LOVE science; if there is one thing I can count on in the academic world, it is feeling happy and at peace when I am in the lab.

I want to reminder my peers to take time for themselves.  We are at a very stressful time in our lives (midterms, job hunts, grad school apps, graduation….), but take time to listen to your favorite song or converse with your friends over dinner.  I am beyond grateful to have my parents in my life, and my friends.  Without them I would not be as sane as I currently am.

Yom Tov

Hello Everyone!

Unfortunately, I started to write this post on Sunday and never posted it!

I hope that everyone had a great Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.  I am thankful that my parents were able to come up for Erev Yom Kippur and Kol Nidrei.  Dinner before the fast was catered from Brent's Deli: Chicken Matzah Ball Soup, Latkes, deli Turkey, deli Pastrami, deli Cornbeef, Rye Bread and Chinese Marble Cookies.  My suite mates and I have been eating almost non-stop since yesterday evening.  I cannot imagine going back and eating dinning hall food for dinner.  I would much prefer to eat Brent's Deli for days.  They have the best Jewish food on the West Coast.

In the Rabbi's Sermon Friday evening, she talked about truths and lies.  Apparently, 1/5 of every statement a college student tells their parents is a lie.  But where do we learn to lie?  From our parents.  As my parents were there, it is an inside joke.  In fact, it appears as though we lie on a daily basis.  Lies can be as simple as "I like you shirt" when you don't.  If we lie so often, how do we stop?  We can stop by keeping our mouth shut when we cannot tell the truth, or when we do not have something nice to say.  Currently, I am watching Gilmore Girls Season 1 Episode 5 and the topic of when to tell the truth and when to lie came up.  Lorelei said "I don't know what to tell and what to hide"after telling her mother the truth and her daughter telling her to lie.  In my opinion, you should not lie, and if you have to lie to hide something, then telling the truth is a must.

The only update I have on the thesis front is that my experiment has failed twice more.  I only have about another week to complete my experiments for the thesis, but I plan to continue when I can because I want to get the experiments right!  On the grad school front, I finally have a list of schools complete and my letters of rec are starting to get in order!

I am glad that this week is coming to an end.  I have not been sleeping a lot this week due to the busy season that is called midterms.  I had two midterms this week; it was very stressful.  I love learning new information, but I don't believe that exams portray all of the knowledge that I know.  I am excited for this weekend, and being able to take some time for myself to relax and read a book.  I have such amazing friends and family members that have helped get me through this week.  My friend wrote me this amazing sign that she posted on my door this morning that lifted my moods tremendously.

As always, talking to my mother calms me down, and makes me happy.  She knows me so well, and I always feel more relaxed after our conversations.  This week, minions were the key.

And my true minion inspiration: