Repurpose: Shorts to Bag

I’ve made bags before and I’ve made shorts before (pyjama shorts with two seams count, right?) but I’ve never attempted making a bag from a pair of shorts.

***Brief interlude: I just realised I’ve been spelling pajamas (American) instead of pyjamas (other English). Devs!***

I’ve got my SIL’s (that’s sister-in-law) 21st this weekend. She’s a fashion designer so something quirky was always going to be on the cards for a gift, when I saw this which totally got the creative juices flowing.

I wrote a post about a month ago saying I had a big pile of clothes in my wardrobe stashed away for refashion/repurpose projects?! I’ve managed to cut that down a fair bit over the last month…then I found some more! Whoops! In there were these pair of pants.

They’d already been unpicked when I needed the zip about two years ago for this nappy bag I made a friend for her baby shower.

The pants were going to produce the perfect-sized bag, which meant I didn’t need to pull apart the waistband or anything crazy like that. I unpicked the inner leg and crotch seams and trimmed off the curve (any of you who have made pants before know what I’m talking about) – and this was the only material I had left over come completion!

Then I sewed the fronts together and the backs together, much like you would when converting pants to a skirt. After that it was all really straight forward!

I had a feeling I was going to find this one a bit hard to part with, so I added a big ‘C’ using reverse appliqué  First time I’ve ever attempted it and I’ll definitely be doing it again!

Love this bag! So happy I have other ‘fat pants’ in my wardrobe to convert!

   

Mango Chicken (egg-free, dairy-free, nut-free)

I had a bit of left over chicken from last night’s roast dinner and thought I’d better whip something up for my girls. We’re going on a road trip and I’m not sure what time we’ll reach out destination. When you have a child with allergies, it’s always better to be prepared than to have your child eating a banana for dinner because that’s all you’ve got!

This one is bit of a cross between a sweet and sour and a curry. I wasn’t aiming for this to be a big meal, just enough to feed my girls. If I was (making a large meal) I would have added more vegetables and sauce.

Ingredients:

• 1 mango, skin removed & flesh roughly chopped
• 2 heaped tsp brown sugar
• 1/2 tbl white vinegar
• 1 tsp lime juice
• 1 tbl soy sauce
• 1/2 tsp ginger
• 100g crushed tomatoes
• 1/2 capsicum, chopped
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1 small sweet potato, cubed
• 1 smal carrot, grated
• 1 tsp Thai red curry paste
• Shredded chicken
• 1/2 cup chicken stock

Method:

1. Add mango, sugar, vinegar, lime, soy and ginger to  a jug and puree with stick mixer (or similar). Add crushed tomatoes.
2. Place potato with a small amount of water to microwave safe container and follow microwave instructions to cook.
3. Heat a small amount of oil in a frypan. Add onion, capsicum and curry paste. Cook for 2-3 minutes. Add carrot. Cook for further 2 minutes.
4. Add shredded chicken, mango sauce and stock. This step is to only combine flavours as all components are already cooked. Remove from heat when satisfied with flavours.

 

Jaffa Marble Cake (dairy-free, egg-free, vegan)

So it looks like two weeks of non-stop sewing has been followed by two weeks of non-stop cooking! Am I erratic or what? Next you might notice I’ve stopped posting all together because I’ve decided to read an entire fiction series! That’s just how I roll!

Back to my jaffa marble cake now! I found a recipe here which I’ve adapted because it wasn’t quite right. I added extra cocoa and milk to the chocolate batter, extra rind and pulp to the orange mixture. I also halved the batter so it only produces 1 cake. My recipe is as follows.

Ingredients Orange Cake:

• 3/4 zest of orange
• 3/4 orange flesh and juice pureed
• 90g vegan butter, melted
• 1 ½ teaspoons vinegar
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
• ½ cup sugar
• 3/4 cup SR flour

Ingredients Chocolate Cake:

• 90g vegan butter, melted
• 1 ½ teaspoons vinegar
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
• ½ cup sugar
• 3/4 cup SR flour
• 2 tablespoons cocoa
• ⅓ cup soy milk

Ingredients Icing:

• 1/4 cup vegan butter
• ½ cup icing mixture
• 1 ½ tablespoons cocoa

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 170°C (fan forced).
2. Add flour and sugar to two bowls.
3. Add melted butter to each bowl.
4. To one bowl add rind and pulp. To the other add cocoa and milk.
5. Mix first lot of vinegar and baking powder. Stir vigorously and add to orange batter.
6. Mix second lot of vinegar and baking powder. Stir vigorously and add to chocolate batter.
7. Spoon alternating blobs of chocolate and orange batter into cake tin. Swirl a knife through for marbled effect.
8. Bake for 45 to 60 mins or until cooked through.
9. Once cooled. Prepare icing by sifting icing mixture and cocoa over butter. Cream until combined. Spoon over top and sides of cake.

 

I was a bit sceptical of adding baking soda to self-raising flour, especially in the large quantity the recipe called for. I was afraid it was going to come out tasting like acid, but I couldn’t taste the baking powder at all! This recipe produces a lovely moist cake. Next time I make it I will probably add the rind of the whole orange and possibly a little more cocoa to the icing.

Potato Stamped Christmas Cards

I got up this morning to find a purple and blue wall in the dining room. Whoops! I forgot to put the paints away after happily stamping Christmas cards yesterday afternoon and my darling 3 year old decided to try some unsupervised painting while I was still in bed!

I don’t normally do Christmas cards. I think cards are somewhat redundant if you’re going to be able to deliver the message personally, be it birthdays or Christmas. But this year there is a big chunk of family we won’t get to see, thus presenting a wonderful card-making opportunity. I don’t think I’ve made cards in bulk since my first daughter was born – this was about the time I took up sewing

So yesterday was actually the first time I’d ever made a potato stamp, that I can recall anyway! Clearly I’m not living life to the full! It was actually quite simple and I managed to cut out two stamps without removing any of my fingers in the process!

What You’ll Need:

• Potato
• Sharp knife
• Paint
• Paint brush
• Something to stamp

What You’ll Need To Do:

1. Cut your potato in half. Where you cut it will depend on the shape of your desired ‘stamp’. Make sure you cut through in one slice to give your stamp a flat and even surface.
2. Lightly score your design on the potato.
   
3. Start cutting away the bits you don’t want. Work in sections.The outside bits are the easiest.

   

4. Any sections that need to be removed from the inside can be done by angling your knife, thus removing cone-shaped pieces.
5. Once you’re done, paint your stamp and stamp away!
   

These cards are a work in progress. Once we’re done I’ll put up some more pictures!

                                         

Caramelised Pear Upside-Down Cake (egg-free, dairy-free, vegan)

I adapted a recipe I found here for pineapple upside-down cake.

Ingredients:

• ½ cup vegan margarine (105g)
• ½ cup brown sugar
• 2 pears, thinly sliced
• 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• 1 ⅓ cups sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ½ cup vegetable oil
• 1 cup soy milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ cup stewed pears, drained and pureed (2/3 pears)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 160°C (fan forced).
2. In a small pot melt the margarine and add the sugar.  Stir over low heat until the sugar dissolves remove from the heat and set aside.
3. Grease and flour a 10” spring form pan very well. Pour the melted margarine and sugar mixture into the bottom of the spring form pan making sure to spread it evenly across the bottom.  Then place pear slices on top of the sugar mixture.
4. In a large bowl combine the flour, sugar,  baking powder and salt.  Add the vegetable oil, soy milk,  pear puree and vanilla extract.  Stir until all the ingredients are well combined.
5. Pour the cake batter over the pineapple slices. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean when inserted in the centre.
6. Run a knife around the edge of the pan to loosen the cake. Let the cake completely cool before removing the outer ring. Once you have removed the outer ring, gently invert onto a serving platter and remove the bottom of the spring form pan.

Notes:

• Some of the margarine may leak out of the spring form pan so place a piece of foil underneath and turn the edges up so If anything does leak out it will leak onto the foil and not onto the bottom of your oven.
• I cover the base of my pan with baking paper before attaching the ring. Then I cut off extra paper with scissors. This helped with the leaking problem mentioned above.

So it’s all cooked and my house smells AMAZING!! I have high hopes for this cake, even the raw batter tasted nice!

…and the verdict?

It’s a winner!

 

I’ve never made an upside-down cake before, so my technique was virtually non-existent (hence the caramel all down the sides and the uneven pear)…but the taste! Yummo! I’ll definitely be making this one again.

 

Sweet Potato & Tuna Curry (dairy-free, egg-free, nut-free)

This is somewhat of a dairy-free tuna mornay.

Ingredients:

• 1 onion
• 1 teaspoon crushed garlic
• 3 tablespoons curry paste (I’ve used Korma curry, you may need to adjust quantity for other pastes)
• 3 small sweet potatoes, chopped coursely
• 1 cup water
• 1 teaspoon chicken stock
• 1 400mL can coconut milk
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 425g can tuna, drained

Method:

1. Fry off onion and garlic in a little oil until soft. Add curry paste. Stir to coat.
2. Add chopped sweet potato, water and stock. Bring to the boil and simmer until potato is soft and most of the water has boiled off.
3. Add coconut milk, sugar and tuna. Stir.
4. Simmer for a few more minutes.

Done! Serve with rice or pasta.

Notes:

You can leave this one nice and simple, or you can add some diced vegetables.

Honey Oat Slice (dairy-free, egg-free, B gluten-free)

What is harder than catering for allergies? Producing allergy-friendly recipes that the non-allergy sufferer will happily gobble down too! Well here is one such recipe. I created this one for my daughter who is highly allergic (anaphylaxis) to egg, dairy, nuts and, until recently, was allergic to wheat, rye and barley too! At one point very early in her life she was also allergic to soy and lived on fruit/veg and meat only!

Since we’re no longer allergic to wheat I’ll be making this slice with wheat flour. If you need to, you can use any gluten-free flour. I used to use a soy/tapioca/maize blend – the soy component stopped our baked goods from drying out, a common complaint of gluten-free flours.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups rolled oats
• 1 1/2 cups plain flour
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 1 1/2 cups desiccated coconut
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 150g dairy-free margarine
• 3/8 cup honey (6 tablespoons)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180°C. Line and grease 24x29cm pan.
2. Combine all dry ingredients in a bowl. Mix well.
   
3. Combine margarine and honey in a separate bowl and microwave until margarine is melted.
4. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix until combined.
   
5. Press mixture into pan.
6. Bake for 25-30 minutes until golden.
   
7. Cut into slices while hot and leave to cool in the pan.

Done!

Notes:

• Oats contain B gluten. Some allergy/celiac sufferers can handle B gluten, some cannot!
• If you like your slice more like a giant biscuit, add more margarine!