More Magnificent Op Shop Finds

Remember that 20 cent broderie anglaise I posted about a little while ago. Here is what became of it:

Matched with a little blue floral and plain blue cotton (and lined with some other cotton) it became a delightful little girl's dress. Op Shop sewing is my new favourite thing and a couple of weeks ago the sewing stash increased with more wonderful op shop fabrics.I intended to post about it and took a few pics, but time got away from me. In the meantime some of the smaller pieces were turned into things. Highlights include:

 This large piece of thai silk. It has been hemmed around the edges so it has taken up residence as a lovely table cloth. Yes I know it is a little bit posh to use thai silk for a table cloth - but it was only $2 so I don't feel that guilty.

These pink beauties haven't been used yet, though the houndtoothish one is earmarked for a dress, and the paler pink number for a skirt. The top one is over 3 metres by 90cms wide, while the bottom one is over 4 metres by 112 cms wide! Neither cost more than $4. Bargain prices for amazing vintage fabrics.

 And just when you thought it couldn't get any pinker it is time ... for some more pink:

This cute pink gingham was purchased for the princely sum of a dollar. It must have had a bad turn with the iron because by the looks of it, it used to have a former life as seersucker cloth. It had a few bubbles to it but these had lost their groove. It also made it a little stiffer than other fabrics but I thought it had character. It served its intended purpose well - as one of the dress I submitted for the Dress a Girl Campaign. I know I've said it before, but it is a great cause, so go check it out! I used this pink dress to practice button holes, and added a few bits of trim and patches I had in the stash.

Don't worry, it wasn't all pink as you can see by the assorted collection below:

 Most of these were at least a metre in length, and ranged in price from 50cents to $2. A quick wash and they were good to go. Some were used as lining. The grey is earmarked to become a work dress. The brown stripes became pyjama pants (intended for the lovely other half but were so botched by my lack of sewing skills that they remained as mine.) Most of the other fabrics also became (or will become) girls' dresses. Wanna check them out? Well you can't, because that's for another post ... but if you really must know the blue dress at the beginning of this post was also submitted. Along with 18 others!

Chocolate Hazelnut Pavlova a la Prue

This is going to be a recipe post of sorts. A dear reader asked for the chocolate hazelnut pavlova recipe and I wish I could add a link, but really I just made it up. But I am happy to oblige so here is the recipe a la Prue. I can even promise that it will be step by step, just like a Women's Weekly recipe, and it will have some pictures like ALL good WW recipes. But unlike recipes from any WW book it isn't triple tested. Recipes to me (except for pasta dough and biscuits from the WW ones) are a guideline, a starting point, an idea. I don't follow them religiously and I'm pretty poor at measuring in most cases. I play with them, make up my own, and measurements are certainly flexible. So with the 'recipe' I give here feel free to add your own flair, play with measurements and generally do as you please. Because I do, and it is a lot of fun.

Chocolate Hazelnut Pavlova - twice taste tested and met with approval.

I used different measurements each time for this and both worked out well. Don't follow them exactly if you think I am a bit out. Use your own thoughts, and go with your instincts if you want a bigger or smaller amount. I'll also break this up into its three component parts to make it easier but the overall ingredient list is:

6 Eggs separated
2 - 2.5 cups castor sugar (it depends on how sweet you like your custard, but the sugar in the meringues is a little less negotiable)
1 pkt hazelnut meal - (the 175gram or 150 gram one is best)
Cocoa - 1-2 tablespoon cup or more, depending on how much you like cocoa. You can use drinking chocolate instead of this if you feel so inclined.
1 block of really dark chocolate (99% Lindt is amazing in this, the bitter the better because this does tend to be super sweet but cooking dark chocolate or even milk will work just fine, simply add less sugar to the custard)
Milk - 500mls give or take
Cornflour - 1-2 tablspoons
Vanilla
Vanilla sugar (optional, but it goes amazingly in the meringue and in the custard too)
Chocolate bits and other chocolate goodies like flake, caramello. No set amount, just cram them on top!

Base - Hazelnut Pavlova

From the ingredients listed above you'll need the:

 6 egg whites
1.5 cups castor sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla sugar (optional but super amazing in ANY meringue. I get mine from Gewurzhaus on Lygon Street and it is delicious.)

This is the meringue bit, and I took inspiration on ratios and timings and temperatures from a lemon curd pav recipe and meringue I used to make as a child from the WW Beautiful Biscuits book. That's the old '80s version, not the new fangled version so you'll need to get lucky at an op shop or school fete to get your hands on one of those. Or there is always ebay.

Step 1 - Put 6 eggs whites (or as many as you want, just remember it is one cup of castor sugar for every four egg whites) in a bowl and beat until soft peaks form. You will want an electric beater for this, or at least a horde of willing helpers because you will be beating for a LONGGGGGGGGGGGGGG time. If they are firm peaks don't stress, this is fine too. You be the judge.

Step 2 - Gradually add castor sugar (and vanilla sugar it you have decided to use it) to the stiff egg whites, about 1/4 a cup at a time, beating constantly at a mid-high beat. The recipe says 1 tablespoon at a time but I'm never that patient. Basically you want to let it begin to dissolve, and evenly distribute, hence you don't dump all the sugar in at one time. 

Step 3 - Once all the castor sugar is in beat it on high for 15 minutes. I kid you not, 15 minutes. This seems like ages but it will make it one glossy and firm meringue - and you will need it firm particularly as you are about to do steps 4 and 5.

Step 4 - Add in 1/4 cup cocoa or drinking chocolate, whatever you have on hand and mix it a bit.

Step 5 - Discard the beaters, and lick the tastey, tastey meringue off them if you wish (don't forget to unplug the thing first or risk tongue amputation.) Dump all the hazelnut meal into the meringue mixture and fold it through with a wooden spoon. It'll take a little while to mix in but you can be a bit rough with it. If you've beaten it for 15 minutes your arm will be pretty tired anyway so you probably don't have the strength left to stuff it up.

Step 6 - Place the mixture onto a big baking tray that has been lined with baking paper. Forgot the baking paper or don't have any??? Then never fear, a swipe of butter or oil, and a sprinkle of cornflour will help make the meringue not stick to the tray. Pile it up high, and pile it up evenly. You could draw a 20cm circle in the paper and make sure you meringue between the lines but I am far too lazy for that - and besides no matter how pretty it is,  this sucker is going to sink a bit anyway.

Step 7 - In the oven it goes, at 150C for 15 minutes, then 120C for 45-50 minutes. After that's over turn the oven off and leave the pav in there to cool. This makes it super and crispy on the outside, but moist in the middle. While that's cooling I'd suggest having a long cup of tea, maybe a bit of a read or watch some West Wing (I think that's what we were watching at the time.) It is going to take a few hours so take the time to chill out. All relaxed - good - then it is on to making the custard.

Chocolate custard

You don't have to make chocolate custard just for this recipe. Chocolate custard it is delicious at any time. Custard is delicious at any time. And if you don't want to separate eggs then you don't need to. I just use whole eggs when I'm making custard on its own and it works just fine. But here is the recipe for this layer and these are the ingredients you will need from the list:

those 6 remaining egg yolks (keep them at room temp, they'll be fine)
1/2 cup -1 cup castor sugar depending on how bitter/sweet your chocolate it and how sweet you like your custard. I like really dark bitter chocolate with about 2/3 cup of castor sugar.
Milk - 500mls but you don't have to be too exact
Cornflour - 1-2 tablspoons
Vanilla - 1big gulp (1 teaspoon for those counting at home)
Vanilla sugar (optional, but it also goes well in the custard)
1 block of really dark chocolate

* Now if you want to be super cocky you can put some cognac or kahlua in this custard. You could add it with step 1. It is super decadent and totally awesome. Except that this is a teetotal blog, so for this year at least I'm going without the alcohol in this recipe.

Step 1 - Put milk, vanilla sugar, vanilla and castor sugar in a medium saucepan on the stove over medium temperature until sugar(s) is/are dissolved. You do want to stir this a bit while it is heating, but no need to be obsessive. I always do step 2 while I'm doing step 1 in this recipe. You want this milk to be quite warm, almost hot, but if it is boiling you'll have to let it cool down or your custard will be a curdled mess. I'd like to say a little more than baby bottle warm is the temp you need, so I will say it. You can add a tablespoon or two of cocoa to the milk too if you like, or even drinking chocolate, but you don't have to. My tea/coffee/hot chocolate section is in easy reach of my stove so it usually leads me to experimental chocolate additions.

Step 2 - While the milk mix is cooking, whisk egg yolks and cornflour vigourously in a large(ish) bowl. It'll go pale after a few minutes so whisk it until it is that colour and lump free.

Step 3 - Add the heated milk to the egg mix very slowly, in a fine stream, whisking constantly. I borrow the lovely other half to help out with this part as I am a bit too unco to get the flow right. But you can do it on your own (ihave, but shhhhh don't tell him that.) Make sure you whisk the mix the entire time to make sure it combines. Adding the hot ingredient to the cold ingredient reduces the chance of curdling.

Step 4 - Once it is all whisked and mixed and probably super frothy (don't worry that froth will go down eventually) add it back to the saucepan you heater the milk in and put it back on the stove, low-med heat. Stir/mix the custard for a few minutes, sometimes lots of minutes, it depends - but until it starts to thicken. You might be stirring for a while thinking goodness ... hurry up ... will this mix ever thicken ... has it thickened and I just don't know it??? - but don't worry, when it happens you will know  and it will be a noticeable difference.

Step 5 - Once thickened take it off the stove and mix in the broken up block of chocolate. Stir continuously until combined and then transfer to a container for cooling.
 Any container will do really. And that's your custard done.

Chocolate top - and custard middle and pav bottom

Ingredients - the other two bits you just made, cooled and ready to go.
Any chocolate stuff you want on top and I mean ANY CHOCOLATE STUFF!
Berries - yeah you could add berries, but why bother, this is a chocoholics wet dream so don't water it down with something healthy

Assemble the thing shortly before serving, or at the very least only a few hours before. It will keep just fine in the fridge but it will sink and smush together. It is still tasty, but it gets a little moist and the pavlova turns into more of a torte.

Step 1 - Place the pav base on a serving plate or simply the biggest plate you can find.

Step 2 - Put the custard on top of the pav base, covering it generously. Use a spoon, a knife, whatever you feel like. It is like icing a cake but more tastey.

Step 3 - Arrange chocolate bits on top of the pav. Keep adding more and more, don't be stingey. Add white chocolate bits too, and some of the good stuff your mum keeps hidden that she thinks you don't know about but you totally do. Add in last year's liquer chocolate from christmas - they'll be treasure bombs for the over 18s who aren't on a teeltotal year.

Step 4 - serve and enjoy and try to avoid a diabetic coma from eating more than one slice.

I've probably not explained this overly well, and it is darn wordy, so feel free to ask any questions in the comments section or seek clarification.

20 dresses and 20 tomatoes but only 8 hours to cook

I've been a domestic goddess of late. Sewing, Gardening, Cooking and Meandering around Melbourne have all been on the agenda.

Sewing

I sent off 20 dresses to the Dress and Girl campaign today and am so excited. I hope Australia Post takes good care of them. I'll add some  more pics in a later post, but for now the one above of a few of the dresses will have to do. I'm relaxing away from the sewing machine (though feeling the urge to crawl back and sew some more.) I pretty much made one dress a day for the last few weeks. It is such a great cause, I urge you to visit the Australia website and check it out. Take part in whatever way you can, and make a difference in a young girl's life. It may seem like a small thing, but empowerment through the most trivial seeming things can make such a difference.

Gardening

Apart from sewing I've been gardening. The lovely other half has been helping and we've successfully potted up several of the balcony garden trees and large plants. We've also added a tonne of new plants, with full details available over at my other blog. The most exciting bit is the addition of, what will be, over 20 new tomato plants. Here are some of them:

Tomatoes have had a patchy history on the balcony garden. The first year they flourished, but the year after that they all wilted early (and not one of the usual wilts either, it was weird.) Last year I only planted a couple and they did reasonably well. However, this year I threw caution to the wind, and threw the the contents of my wallet at various nurseries and invested in about 10 different varieties. I only grow from seedlings, simply because that seemed to work the best (the year they all died, most were from home raised seeds.) Hopefully we will be eating delicious tomatoes in a few months time.

Cooking

Lettuce is in the garden too, but I won't be using it for tonight's meal. Lettuce and mint wrapped chicken sausages are on the menu tonight, though it is with store bought lettuce, until the other is big enough. It is an idiot proof meal, oven baked sausages wrapped in a lettuce leaf with some mint from the garden thrown in. Other meals have been a little more time consuming. For instance I made pulled pork two Sundays ago. Overnight marination followed by 8 hours in the oven, it was, for lack of any other terms, heavenly. The lovely other half devoured it willingly and I found it delightful both in rolls with BBQ sauce and in a stir fry. It was so good I'll be making it again this weekend for a few guests.

Meandering

We went up to the Dandenongs last Sunday with a dear friend. It was lovely, great food, great views, too many tourists but great company which made up for it. The lush green of the properties up there was really enticing but I'm still glad I live where I do.

And all without drinking a drop. In fact most days I don't even think about alcohol anymore. Well ok I do sometimes, and I tell people I miss it, but I don't think I really mean that.

More sewing (but for a good cause)

I think I have an addiction. Actually, I know I have an addiction ... and it is sewing. Pretty obvious from the posts here that it is taking over my life. It's not a problem at the moment because I have quite a lot of spare time until TFA starts. Even though money is tight I have such a large stash already to sew and I have discovered a few awesome op shops that sell fantastic fabrics at even more fantastic prices (1 metre square of new, non-pilly, thick blue broderie anglaise for 20 cent! 20 CENTS!!!!!!!)

I also have many cottons leftover from Mum's collection that needed using up. All I required was a cause - because people only need so many aprons and bags and other goodies. Mum loved her apron by the way - and I can finally release the pics of it:

Patchwork one side, and brocade on the other.

So what next??? ... Bring on the shorts, skirts, so many many skirts, and Dress a Girl around the World.

Shorts - not my strength

I made myself a pair of shorts. I believe the term used is 'camel toe'. So while they are super comfy, they will be simply house shorts for the moment. The material was lovely, part of the first op shop find so only a dollar or two slightly wasted.

Then I made the lovely other half a pair of shorts. I used the blue and brown striped materialfrom the op shop pile:

  I believe the term in this case is 'Hammer Pants'. Even with a pattern made from his own pants, I guess I underestimated and overestimated his actual dimensions and then ended up with a short-crotched, overly-gathered mess. But with a crotch lengthening they've been happily included in his 'around the house' wardrobe. Awwww, he is so lovely. Again only a couple of dollars of op shop material, so not a big waste, and they are supposed to be very comfortable.

Skirts

First off I finally defeated that pattern, the pattern of doom, the pattern I had twice pulled out of its wrapping, made a confused face at the 'instructions' and promptly repackaged and placed back in the drawer. Once I used the old grey matter (and translated the instructions in Prueish) I made not one, not two, not three, but 4 versions of this skirt! Three were for me. The first was a green tartan practice version to get sizing (this material was more amenably priced than muslin.) I don't have a picture of the skirt, but look at the green tartan in the previous picture of op shop materials, and imagine it in a longer version of the other skirts.

The second was a wonderful purple number, which was a bit shorter and looks better on me than in the picture.

The third was op shop material in a black, grey and white swirly pattern. It has a little stretch to it. This is a terrible photo as it is folded over on one side, but it is the only one I have and it shows the material well.

 

This blue version is for a much skinnier friend - which means I need to work out how to put a zip in (the skirts in my size put over my large backside scarily easily, though never seem to fall down.) I'll get mum to show me when I next visit Adelaide because my sewing machine instructions for zips were the only thing more confusing than the pattern instructions (yes I have a PhD so I'm not entirely daft, sewing pattern instructions are simply gibberish.)

 I have some amazing medieval lady fabric that is too small to make me yet another version, so I have plans to use this skirt pattern to make it for a dear friend who helped me work out how to weight them hems properly. You see as comfortable as these skirts are, and they really are comfortable, and as amazingly flattering as they are on my oddball (emphasis on the ball) shape, they weren't perfect. None of the materials used had enough weight to stay down in the breeze, and more annoyingly, the static or just the material itself keeps catching on my stockings and pulling the skirt up. I am not keen on flashing Melbourne on a daily basis so I needed a solution. The lovely friend suggested 20 cent coins as weights, so I'm going to give it a try

(* I should note here that my lovely other half had already suggested weights, and he was certainly right, it was simply this friend who suggested the kind of weights to use. Although if he wished to be made a skirt to say thankyou I'd definitely oblige.)

Dresses

In the last post I showed you little pillowcase dresses I have made for friends and others. Given most of my friends either don't have or want kids, or only have boys, I quickly ran out of people to sew for. And goodness know little girls don't want that many Prue-made dresses in their collection (though I am very heartened that the dress I made for a uni friend's daughter was much loved, and even though it was a little too big she wore it all night when she first recieved it!)

But I still had to scratch the dress sewing itch. And I wasn't up to making me any yet (If you saw my shape, and the troubles my amazing sewer of a mother had in fitting me you'd understand that it involves an everest sized leap in skills.) So I just kept sewing, and sewing and sewing these little pillowcase dresses. I made patchwork ones, ones out of the 20 cent material, the amazing 50 cent thick cotton paisley material, from ribbons and lace and anything I had in the stash. But I wasn't without purpose because I had stumbled upon a cause, a worthy cause. One which I will contiune to sew towards - Dress a Girl (around the world) Australia. Here is the local webpage.

I'm just putting the finishing touches on my first batch to send off tomorrow. But I'd suggest if you have time to sew, sew a few dresses for this great cause (yes its a bit gendered, yes there is post-colonial issues written all over it, but I don't care, I think it is a wonderful cause regardless and will donate and donate again.) If you can't sew then you can donate to it too (fabric, pillowcases, money for postage.)

Once the dresses are sent, I'll post about them in more detail. Until then, enjoy this little dress, which I won't be donating to Dress a Girl but gives an idea of the kinds of dresses I've been sewing. If you can't work out why I am not donating it then look at the Victorian era children playing in the centre panel and refer to earlier comments on post colonlial issues.

Blood Limes

We were really just on a mission to go to the Vic Markets, buy some food for the week and had one last stop to go. We popped by the usual stall to get some apples and get on home. But when we saw there little wonders we lingers with fascination and just had to try them. Blood limes - they're the finger lime accident that tastes just so good.

Though recommended for drinks (alcoholic and non-alcoholic alike) we managed to use them as a garnish for fish. The other half had it with his oven baked fish. I'm not a fresh fish girl so stuck with cardboard oven baken fish fingers (yes  I know most people think these are feral but I like them, and I gave up alcohol for a year so I have to have at least one other vice.) The blood limes were delicious when squeezed on both fish dishes.

The carrots we got from a stall at a farmer's market in Flemington were also rather delicious.

I love heirloom and wierd veggies and fruits - just see my gardening blog for proof.