Mass Specs and Macarons

About a year ago I decided to try and learn how to make French Macarons.  I like to think that I have some kind of talent when it comes to baking.  The reality of it is, that anyone who attempts baking has some disaster at some point!  If you have ever watched the Great British Bake Off, then you know that even the best bakers have bad days.  Baking is extremely temperamental.  Even though you are good at it and you know what you are doing, it can still end in utter frustration.

Well, my first problem was my recipe.  It said to use Almond meal, so I bought Almond meal, Haha, big mistake!  It also lacked very detailed instructions about mixing the egg whites and other details that could have been helpful.  This baking experience ended with a runny, lumpy mess that I had to scrape off of the pan.  I think I gave up on scraping the pan and just threw the whole thing away!  This is where I learned a very valuable lesson about using parchment paper!

Several months later I watched some YouTube videos and read many recipes.  Almond Flour! You are supposed to use almond flour!!  I decided to try again and they worked this time.  The 2nd time I tried it they did not turn out well at all.  They looked like one of those Pinterest FAIL memes you see on Facebook.  So after hitting the internet up for some more advice about Macarons I discovered that I should be weighing my ingredients instead of measuring them.

"These French macarons are only 5 ingredients, they should be easy", I thought.  They are simply almond flour, powdered sugar, regular sugar, gel food coloring, and egg whites.  I have had more success with weighing the ingredients.  If you don't weigh it just right, mix it precisely, and let them sit long enough after piping, they won't work.  After piping them onto a baking sheet they must sit long enough to form the unique film on the top that allows them to bake without cracking.

This reminds me a lot of Mass Spectrometers.  Yes, that might sound completely weird, but it is true.  My favorite saying at work is "something went wrong somewhere!"  They are extremely temperamental instruments.  The temperature and humidity in the lab must be at the set standard and constant, any changes could cause problems.  They have to be tuned and maintained everyday.  Parts have to be checked and changed out monthly and yearly.  The parts and reagents that are required to run the instrument are very pricey.

Mass Specs ionize molecules and separates them by mass to charge ratio.  We combine liquid chromatography with the selectivity of the mass spec in order to analyze just about anything.  Before something is analyzed on a mass spec instrument it must go through an extraction process.  This process involves many very detailed steps and can take a good amount of time.  This process is to isolate certain molecules.   If you want to measure estrogen or testosterone then the 2-3 hour extraction isolates that molecule in a person's sample. It then can go on the mass spec.  With mass spec, multiple analytes can be measured at the same time.

The detail and fine tuning involved in these two processes reminds me of the details in our lives.  Do you believe in coincidence?  Well of course there are coincidences in our lives, but there is also divine design.  Have you ever had an experience that caused you to think "coincidence", but the more you thought about it the more you realized that something bigger just took place?

This sort of thing happened to me last summer.  I happened to be at church one Sunday when I just happened to see my Institute HOPE Choir instructor at my church in the foyer after the 1st hour.  I hadn't seen him in 10 years.  I had been feeling kind of down at this time in my life.  Have you ever felt like you are an easily forgettable person?  This was how I was feeling.  We were sitting out in the foyer talking to someone when I looked toward the doors and Brother McAffee was standing about 10 feet away from me.  He looked at me and immediately came over and embraced me and called me by name.  I was taken aback by his sudden memory of me.  He said "you were one of my favorite students!"  And I said" wow I thought you wouldn't remember me"!   It is quite possible that I was unforgettable because I was one of the few students in his entire career to injure themselves during rehearsal.  After dislocating my knee I hobbled around with a knee brace for 3 months not being able to fulfill all of my roles in performance that season! Haha!

I had the opportunity to introduce my family to him and his wife.  It was a special reunion moment!  I learned that him and his wife were on a mission in Hawaii and he came back to Utah to have some intense dental work done.  His daughter, who they were staying with, was in the other ward that met in our church building.  He was only there for about two days before having to fly back to the mission.

The more I pondered on this experience the more I felt that Heavenly Father brought someone I knew to tell me that I was remembered.  What are the chances that he would be in Utah for two days, at his daughters house, who lived close enough to me to go to the same church, and that he would go to that church at that time that day, and that I would be in the foyer after sacrament meeting so we could cross paths!?!?  CRAZY, and incredibly detailed.  Not only that, but it was the immense feeling of peace and comfort that came from his words!

I do believe God works in mysterious ways!  Its amazing to me that, just when I needed a lift he strategically placed this old friend in my way.  I don't believe it was just a coincidence.  I think that is the word we too often use to explain instances like this and then sometimes we don't give them much more thought!  When we do give them more thought, we may unfold a very intricate and specific plan that was placed before us by the Divine Designer!

I also believe that when we follow the recipe that is God's plan we may have the opportunity to experience more of these types of events, or maybe it is that we recognize them easier as divine intervention.  If we are not following a good recipe or we don't have a recipe, life can get confusing and we might end up feeling like the Pinterest fail.  While we are in our feelings of failure we may fail to recognize God's hand in our lives.

Empower yourself!  Ponder on the Divine Design in your own life!  Reconsider those "coincidence" moments!