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I still can't believe I got a speeding ticket on Tower Bridge. I was driving at 30 mph, and I got a ticket...guess what, Tower Bridge has a speed limit of 20 mph. I did a search online and found that the speed limit is set to 20 mph (as opposed to 30 mph for the rest of London) because it reduces vibrations that may damage the bridge. Um...how about the big buses?

Tower Bridge is as iconic as it gets for London (surpassed only by Big Ben, perhaps). The bridge's design was decided upon by an open competition, where 50 designs were submitted for consideration. It wasn't until October 1884 however, that Horace Jones, the City Architect, in collaboration with John Wolfe Barry, offered the chosen design for Tower Bridge as a solution.

It took 8 years, 5 major contractors and the relentless labour of 432 construction workers to build Tower Bridge. Two massive piers were sunk into the river bed to support the construction and over 11,000 tons of steel provided the framework for the Towers and Walkways. This framework was clad in Cornish granite and Portland stone to protect the underlying steelwork and to give the Bridge a more pleasing appearance.

When it was built, Tower Bridge was the largest and most sophisticated bascule bridge ever completed ("bascule" comes from the French for "see-saw"). These bascules were operated by hydraulics, using steam to power the enormous pumping engines. The energy created was stored in six massive accumulators, as soon as power was required to lift the Bridge, it was always readily available. The accumulators fed the driving engines, which drove the bascules up and down. Despite the complexity of the system, the bascules only took about a minute to raise to their maximum angle of 86 degrees.

Today, the bascules are still operated by hydraulic power, but since 1976 they have been driven by oil and electricity rather than steam. The original pumping engines, accumulators and boilers are now exhibits within the Tower Bridge Exhibition.

Information from www.towerbridge.org.uk

The Brussels Metro may not be as extensive as the London Underground, nor as efficient as the Hong Kong MTR, but it certainly looks pretty good!

After countless batches of cookie dough experiments, I think I've found the perfect cookie dough recipe. The secret is to underbake them so that they stay soft and moist...

Here's how I did it....

Ingredients:
2 Cups plus 2 tablespoon of flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda/bicarbonate soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespon unsalted butter, melted and cooled until warm (about 180 mL)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
chocolate chips (I use diced up Cadbury chocolate bars)

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 160C.

2. Mix dry ingredients together in bowl, set aside.

3. Mix butter and sugar together in a seperate bowl, then add egg, yolk and vanilla extract.

4. Mix the contents of the two bowls together, and this becomes your general all purpose cookie dough!

5. Roll your dough into balls, add in chocolate chips

6. Flatten the balls on a baking tray until they are circular and about 5 mm thick.

7. Bake in the oven at 160 until the sides are just starting to crisp up. At this point the middle is still soft and "uncooked" (for my conventional oven, it's about 10 mintues). Undercooking the cookies is the secret to the perfect soft chewy cookies.

8. Take the baking tray out and leave the cookies to cool on the tray until they are hard enough to manipulate off the tray.

9. Eat your cookies before your neighbors find out you've baked some.

Enjoy!

This one of the easiest things to cook, but an extremely satisfying one! Here's how I did it:

1. dice up chorizo sausage

2. add a couple of tablespoons of olive oil to the pan

3. pan fry chorizo until crispy on the outside

4. remove the chorizo, leaving the release paprika oil in the pan

5. add tin canned tomato, tomato paste and onions

6. season with salt, pepper and paprika

7. add the chorizo back to the pan, add some chopped parsley or basil

8. now the sauce is ready! (turn off the heat)

9. cook the pasta to al dente

10. add the pasta to the sauce and mix

11. serve!

The wall of BMW Welt at Munich. Quite an interesting pattern!

The BMW Welt, Museum and Factory site in Munich. The obvious attraction is the ultimate driving machines that are displayed and built here. But, the building architecture is just as BMW-like, and takes inspiration from the car.