Pie baking weather

12 July, 2015 by admin 2 Comments

Brr, the chill has descended here in Sydney. Pie baking weather, heat the house by turning on the oven for an hour. Win/win!

5.0 from 1 reviews

Rustic Apple, rhubarb and strawberry pie

Auth: Lorena

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: Rustic

Prep time: 20 mins

Cook time: 1 hour 10 mins

Total time: 1 hour 30 mins

Serves: 8

An easy pastry recipe that can be adapted for savoury tarts and pies. It has a lovely soft crumb, like fine shortbread. I make it in the food processor but you can rub in the cold butter with your fingers quickly.

Ingredients

PASTRY
200 grams plain flour
125 grams unsalted butter
2 tablespoons icing sugar mixture
1 egg yolk
2-3 tablespoons cold water
FILLING
3 medium size apples, peeled, cored and sliced
½ lemon, juice and zest
1 bunch rhubarb, washed, trimmed and cut into 5cm lengths
½ punnet strawberries, rinsed, hulled and cut in half
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
½ cup regular sugar
1 teaspoon plain flour
⅓ cup slivered almonds (optional)
⅓ cup caster sugar for sprinkling
icing sugar to garnish
cream, custard or ice cream to serve

Instructions

To make the pastry:
Place flour, icing sugar and butter into the bowl of a food processor.
Pulse until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
Add the egg yolk and a couple of tablespoons of water.
Pulse quickly and then turn out onto a lightly floured bench.
Press the mixture into a ball, it should form a firm dough and stick together. If not, you may need a little more water, not more than a tablespoon at a time or it can get sticky and unmanageable.
Press dough into a flat disc, wrap and refrigerate whilst you prepare your filling.
The recipe work best if you can chill this for ½ hour or more so I often make this ahead of time.
Apple, rhubarb and strawberry filling:
Place rhubarb, apple slices,lemon juice and zest into a saucepan. Cook gently for 5 minutes.
Add ½ cup sugar and vanilla and heat till sugar dissolves.
Set aside to cool.
Roll out your pastry:
Using a rolling pin, roll out the pastry into a loose circle till it's about 35cm across.
Butter a 20cm glass or metal pie dish and drape pastry into the dish, letting the excess pastry hang over the edges. Place it on to a metal oven tray and chill for 15 minutes to allow the pastry to relax again. (It is stressful work being rolled flat you know!)
Heat the oven to 190C whilst you assemble the pie.
Fill the pie crust with the cooked apple and rubharb mix, sprinkle with teaspoon of plain flour.
Place cut strawberries on top.
Sprinkle with slivered almonds.
Bring edges of pastry up and over the pie in soft folds.
Sprinkle the top of the pie with the extra caster sugar.
Place pie with the oven tray underneath in the oven (to catch any drips) and bake for 20 minutes when it should be golden. Cover the top of the pie loosely with foil to prevent scorching and to cook the bottom evenly. Cook a further 20 minutes and remove the foil, if the pie needs a little more cooking and browning leave it in there a little longer. My pies took an hour to cook nicely, could be the size of my oven or the position of the rack, every oven is different!
Serve warm, dusted with a little icing sugar and some cream, ice cream or custard for the ultimate indulgence. Enjoy!

Modern Quilt Show Australia, Kiama

24 June, 2015 by admin 2 Comments

Long overdue blog post number 2 this week. As Miranda’s mum would say, “bear with”!

Topic: Modern Quilt Show Australia, hosted by Wollongong MQG in Kiama, 30th & 31st May.

Okay, right off the bat… I couldn’t attend this show as I’d absentmindedly booked myself out to teach in Brisbane this weekend. Rookie mistake. I will be making this show a priority in my schedule in the future as I heard so many wonderful things about it by those who did attend. Great vibe, exciting quilts, engaging discussions about where modern quilting stands today in Australia.

So, my only means of participating were by submitting two quilts for inclusion in the show. I have to congratulate the hardworking selection panel who picked the quilts to hang in this show, only the second time this event has been held. It’s a lot of work and not all the decisions are easy. From what I could see on social media that weekend and follow up blog posts, the show was a great success. Yay!

When I put my two quilts forward for inclusion they weren’t (ahem) actually finished, but I didn’t expect to have two accepted so I hedged my bets. I guessed which one would be accepted and started quilting that one. Then I received a notification that both were in and I frantically got to finishing them off. To put this in perspective I’d been busy finishing two quilts for the Sydney Show and wrangling together a GWSMQG group quilt entry too. In short, the house got very messy, and I probably wasn’t super social!

I was really happy with my finished quilts, Squircles was started at Quiltcon back in February in Carolyn Friedlander’s Aerial Grove class. I really, really loved making this quilt. I loved the freedom of not using a template or marking pen for the applique technique, I loved finding a variety of prints that would let the gorgeous Lecien yarn dye in the centre shine and I loved piecing the whole thing together like a jigsaw puzzle without referring to a pattern.

The improvisational quilting was a steep learning curve as I’d never tried portioning up a quilt top before and using a different pattern of straight line stitching in each section. It did break the job up and it made it less boring, which seems to be my main issue with quilting. It was still hard to wrangle though, 78″ x 78″ is not a huge quilt but it was still rather hefty to push through a domestic sewing machine. When I had finished both entries I treated myself to some hand quilting watching Carolyn’s Handwork Is Fun Webinar on the MQG website (members only). What a treat!

My second entry was a folly, a spur of the moment idea whilst scrolling through one of my favourite Instagram feeds “I Have This Thing With Floors”. I came upon an image of a tiled floor that I imagined I could make by simply using pre printed stripes. This was my fastest quilt top EVER, I’m working on a pattern for this quilt top so I’ll keep you informed…

I was thrilled to have both my quilts included in the Modern Quilt Show and so excited to hear that I Have This Thing With Floors got a Judges Commendation. Completely unexpected! Nothing for Squircles but it is now one of my favourite quilts! Here’s a list of all the winners.

I did have a hand in a few other winning quilts at the show: Our GWSMQG group quilt won 2nd place in the Group category, My daughter Sofia won 1st Place in the Youth category and another group quilt made with the fun gals I went to QuiltCon with earlier this year won 3rd place.

Thank you to all the organisers and sponsors of the Modern Quilt Show, it’s an exciting time to be a quilter and you are helping to get the word out there x

Phew, long post. One more to come this week. You have been warned…

Desert to Sea: 10 Quilts From Australian Designers

21 June, 2015 by admin 4 Comments

So many exciting things happening around here lately, I’ve fallen behind and so I’ll start with the release of my Opal Essence pattern in Jane Davidson’s fabulous book, Desert To Sea. The book was self published by my clever friend Jane and is available to order right now from Amazon and Book Depository. I know there are a few local fabric stores who are stocking it or taking pre orders too, in most cases this can be a slightly cheaper than paying for the book + overseas postage. Contact Quiltsmith, Material Obsession, Cotton Factory , Patches Indooroopilly and QuiltJane for more information.

Desert To Sea Book: 10 Quilts from Australian Designers

There are 9 other gorgeous quilts in the book by Jane Davidson, Danielle Auckens, Betty Kerr, Cathy Underhill, Charlotte Dumsney, Rachaeldaisy and Jeannette Bruce. The book has well written patterns, wonderful photography and even colouring pages to help you plan your quilt.

You may have seen some photos on Instagram taken whilst teaching this pattern, it’s proving to be a very enjoyable day class and students are learning lots. Take a look at the #opalessencequilt hashtag to be inspired! You’ll see photos of my two other versions of the quilt too #undertheseaquilt and #pinkchampagnequilt.

I’ve had acrylic templates made to help speed up the cutting for this pattern and will be listing sets in my shop next week. The acrylic templates set includes 6 pieces to help cut the diamonds and arcs for machine piecing, I’ll also include a full size A3 template sheet and a packet of pre cut freezer paper shapes to give the applique technique I teach in my classes a try. That will be for another blog post!

Template sets are $35 plus postage. I’m also getting 20 copies of the book to sell together with my templates for those who can’t find them locally. The set will be $70 plus postage.

Please contact me if you’d like to pre-order a set as I expect delivery in the first week of July.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Social Tote Workshop at Material Obsession Saturday 27th June

Chuck Nohara Class at Material Obsession Friday 10th July

Chuck Nohara Class at Material Obsession Saturday 10th July

Lorena presenting at Friday Showcase at The Quilters’ Guild of NSW 7th August

Opal Essence Class at Quiltsmith 26th September

Opal Essence Class at Material Obsession Saturday 24th October

Broccoli and Cannellini Bean Fritters

23 April, 2015 by admin 2 Comments

Broccoli and Cannellini Bean Fritters

Auth: Lorena

Prep time: 10 mins

Cook time: 15 mins

Total time: 25 mins

Serves: 8

Take advantage of delicious in season broccoli with this tasty recipe.

Ingredients

1 medium size head of broccoli
1 tin cannellini beans, drained
1 clove garlic, minced
2 eggs
¾ cup self raising flour
½ teaspoon salt
¼ cup parmesan cheese, grated
½ cup milk
cracked black pepper
oil for shallow frying

Instructions

Bring a large pot of water to the boil.
Chop broccoli florets into medium size pieces, any stems and thicker stalks should be chopped finely so it all cooks at the same time. Toss it into the boiling water, cook uncovered.
Whilst that's cooking, make batter by mixing the remaining ingredients. Season well.
When broccoli is soft but still bright green (pierce a thick stem with a knife to check it's soft) remove from heat, drain and crush with a potato masher.
Add in cannellini beans and mix well.
Add the broccoli and beans to the batter.
Heat enough oil to cover your frypan and fry large tablespoons of the mixture till browned, flip and cook the other side.
Continue to cook in batches, keeping the fritters warm till ready to serve.
Serve with a zesty salad.
*VEGAN OPTIONS*
Replace self raising flour and egg with chick pea flour (besan) and ½ teaspoon baking powder. Besan flour can be a little bitter. Add in extra herbs and spices if this taste is not to your liking.
Replace milk with your preferred milk substitute: eg soy, almond or oat milk.
Replace parmesan cheese with a vegan alternative or almond meal for extra protein but it's not entirely necessary for the recipe. You may want to add extra herbs for a flavour boost, like chopped parsley, spring onions or coriander. Spices like cumin, chilli and paprika will also boost the flavour.

Opal Essence Workshops

18 April, 2015 by admin 3 Comments

It’s so exciting to finally have a pattern and some dates to teach my Opal Essence quilt! Writing instructions and coming up with something semi original is even harder than I had imagined. And very labour intensive. I’ve got some workshop dates booked and I will list them here once they are confirmed. The pattern will be published in a book of Australian quilters soon by Jane Davidson. The lead times for books are so long, but everything happens for a reason, there’s always another typo to correct.

Opal Essence was displayed at last year’s Sydney Quilt Show, since then it’s lead a fairly quiet existence on our sofa. It was in good company and much loved.

What a surprise to then see my quilt on TV as part of a news piece about the quilts hanging at the Australasian Quilt Convention in Melbourne this weekend. What a thrill and honour it was for it to be selected to hang in a curated display showcasing where Australian modern quilting stands today. This was done via the MQG and much work from the Melbourne MQG and Jules McMahon from Canberra MQG. Thanks from those of us who couldn’t be there to help. Kathy Thorncraft also from our GWSMQG has her striking Subdivison quilt hanging too. Lots of great modern quilts, yay!

A bit about the pattern, my original quilt here was needle turn appliqued and then machine pieced using a y-seam construction. But I have also made this quilt with machine pieced curves. There are acrylic template sets available to help with rotary cutting all the pieces.

Below is a machine pieced version of Opal Essence that I have called Pink Champagne, it is a baby size quilt (41′ x 48″) using just 18 blocks.

I’ve got many more ideas for my Opal Essence template, stay tuned for the possibilities.

Workshop Dates:

May 30 Patches, Indooroopilly

May 31 Patches, Indooroopilly

June 7 Wandoo Lane, Gold Coast

June 13 & 14 Cotton Factory, Ballarat

September 26 Quiltsmith, Annandale

October 10 Fairholme Quilters at Cottage Quiltworks, Warriewood

October 24 Material Obsession, Drummoyne

I’m also happy to travel to your quilting retreat or guild to teach a workshop.

Please contact me for fees and available dates.

Lorena 🙂

Apple, Pecan and Bourbon Caramel Cake

22 March, 2015 by admin 1 Comment

Apple, Pecan and Bourbon Caramel Cake

Auth: Lorena

Recipe type: Cake

Prep time: 30 mins

Cook time: 40 mins

Total time: 1 hour 10 mins

Serves: 12

It's healthy... it has fruit. and nuts!!

Ingredients

150 grams butter, softened
¾ cup caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
3 eggs
2 cups self raising flour
1 pinch of salt
½ cup milk
2 granny smith apples, peeled, cored and sliced
1 cup pecans, chopped
50 grams butter
½ cup brown sugar
⅓ cup Bourbon

Instructions

Cream butter, caster sugar and vanilla essence with a stand mixer or electric beaters.
Add in 3 eggs, self raising flour, salt and milk. Mix on medium speed for 2 minutes till smooth and light.
Spread cake batter into a greased springform pan/ cake tin with removable bottom.
Arrange sliced apples over the top and sprinkle with chopped pecans.
Bake at 180C/ 350F for 40 minutes till cake is cooked through and golden.
Meanwhile, make caramel by simmering 50 grams butter, ½ cup brown sugar and ⅓ cup Bourbon till thickened. If you don’t have bourbon use scotch with a little maple syrup and vanilla to flavour it. Or leave it out but call it something else! You know the alcohol cooks out so no need to worry about getting tipsy?
Anyway, when cake has cooled for 10 minutes, pour over warm caramel and let it sit till completely cool before serving.
Or serve cake warm, with ice cream and hot caramel. Yum!

Apple Pecan and Bourbon Caramel Cake blog pic

Emergency hex-it how to…

10 March, 2015 by admin 9 Comments

Well, there’s no point writing a QuiltCon post as you’ve probably read all about it and seen all the photos and besides the tragic and sad demise of my iPhone means I have no photos to share. C’est la vie. Move on Lorena…

So instead, I can finally focus on writing a tutorial to use my Emergency Hex-it kit that I gave to a few friends at QuiltCon. The kits included an acrylic template and seven 1″ hexagon papers, enough to make one hexagon flower. Maybe to keep in your handbag for crafty emergencies, just add fabric, needle and thread and voila – crisis averted!

It comes as a huge surprise that there are still some modern quilters out there who have never tried English paper piecing, oh hello Penny! Probably because I enjoy making samplers which aren’t always terribly modern, I learnt lots of different techniques to try to create all the different blocks.

Pairing up the technique of fussy cutting with English paper piecing can create a kaleidoscope of colour. Whilst it’s possible to machine piece fussy cut hexagons and other shapes, I like the portability of the paper pieced project. The acrylic template makes finding a motif and cutting the fabric super easy.

This tutorial will focus on making the hexie flower, I’ll follow this up with a tutorial to make the zipper pouch in case you can only sew one beautiful fussy cut hexie flower in your lifetime and want to share it with the world. Or you may become addicted and start a whole new quilt. For a grandchild. Mine is taking a while…

What will you need:

1″ Acrylic hexagon template with included 3/8″ seam allowance

7 1′ hexagon papers

fabric glue stick or needle and thread for tacking

strong, sharp needle

strong fine thread, a colour that blends into your fabric

cutting matt

small rotary cutter

a large piece of interesting fabric with at least 6 repeats of a motif (choosing fabric to fussy cut is an art itself, I should really write more about this)

Step 1

Spread out your fabric and slide the template around till you find a motif that you like and that you can see would repeat well. It doesn’t necessarily need to be completely symmetrical but that can help create the kaleidoscope effect. Check that you have six of the motifs on your piece of fabric before you start cutting!

Step 2

Using a small rotary cutter, carefully cut around the template. Be careful not to shift the template and cut as accurately as possible.

You will use this first cut hexagon to position the template for the following 5 identical pieces.

Step 3

Position your template carefully over your hexagon and cut with your small rotary cutter.

Repeat till you have 6 identical hexagons.

Step 4

Here comes the fun part, where you start to see your pattern emerge.

Take one of the fabric hexies, flip it over and place under the template.

Dab a tiny amount of glue in the middle. This will hold the paper template in place.

Step 5

Centre the paper hexagon into the middle of the acrylic template.

Remove the acrylic template and repeat with the rest of your fabric hexies.

Step 6

I prefer to use a glue stick to fold back my seam allowance.

You could also tack them down with needle and thread but I find I get better accuracy with the glue stick.

Use a thin line of glue at least 1/4″ from the edge of the paper. You don’t want to get glue where the needle and thread need to push through.

Fold over the seams one by one, creating neat folds in the corners.

Don’t pull the fabric too tight, you need a tiny gap at the edges to get your needle through later.

Don’t use too much glue! Those papers need to come out at the end.

Repeat with all six hexagons.

Step 7

You’ll need an extra hexagon for the centre, that one needn’t be fussy cut so go ahead and pick a fabric that compliments your design. Then play around with your hexies to find a setting you like. It’s amazing how different they will look as you turn them.

I decided to go with the blue solid.

See that film that I’ve got under my hexie? I’m trying a tip from QuirkyGranolaGirl Melinda, it’s Press’n Seal and it keeps my pieces from disappearing in a gust of wind. High novelty factor as we don’t have this stuff in Australia! Probably a piece of batting will work just as well.

Anyway, time to stitch. I prefer to sew all the “petals” to the centre of the flower first but feel free to do what feels good for you.

Place your two prepared hexies together, make sure you’ve got the right edges together.

Use fine, strong thread and a strong, sharp needle to make little whipstitches over the edges of the templates. Don’t sew through the paper, there should be just enough fabric over the edges to slide your needle through. If not you may have glued your fabric too tightly or used too much glue.

Continue sewing the petals around your central hexie.

Always knot at the corners in case of thread breakage.

Step 8

Continue sewing the hexies together by folding the flower in half and sewing the opposite seams till you’ve sewn all the seams.

You can see the folds here:

Step 9

And voila! your beautiful fussy cut hexie flower is done.

See that wasn’t too hard at all. And don’t worry if it’s not perfect. The eye and brain work very well to forgive imperfection! And if not, take your glasses off or step back.

Next I’ll give you some tips on what you can do with one flower or maybe you want to make a whole quilt full of them?

Will you make one? I’d love to see it. If you share it on IG or Flickr please tag me or #emergencyhexit 🙂

Flat zippy pouch

1 February, 2015 by admin 3 Comments

I added a flat zipper pouch to my #quiltcon2015lanyardswap as I reckon they’re handy to pop in cards and supplies. I don’t make these often enough so I’m writing the process down for later reference. No use reinventing the wheel every time I want to take the car for a spin!

Ingredients:

1 zipper ( for a 6″ pouch I use an 8″ zip)

2 3.5″ x 7″ rectangle of pieced or plain outer fabric

2 3.5″ x 7″ rectangles lining fabric

2 2.5″ squares of fabric for zipper tabs

1 2.5″ x 4″ piece of fabric for split ring loop

1 split ring

Method

1. Prepare zip: fold fabric tabs in half and stitch to cover the zipper ends so that zipper + tabs extend to 7″. Trim excess zipper with strong scissors. Be careful with the metal clip!

2. Layer one outer piece, right side facing up, place prepared zipper face down lining up the top edge. Pull the zipper tab all the way to the top.

3. Top with the lining piece right side down. Pin it together. It should look like a zipper sandwich!

4. Using a zipper foot, stitch along the zipper edge keeping a nice straight seam. When you are half way down, leave the needle down and lift the presser foot. Slide the zipper pull out of the way before finishing the seam. The closer to the zipper you stitch, the less zipper colour will pop through.

5. Repeat with the second side of the zipper, layering outer fabric facing up, prepared zipper facing down and lining fabric facing down. Pin and stitch as before.

6. Open out and press outer and lining fabric away from the zipper. Topstitch either side of the zipper to keep lining out of the zipper teeth. Next you will need to stitch the bottom of the outer and lining separately forming a loop either side of the zip.

7. So, bring the long edge of the outer fabrics together RST (right sides together) above the zip and stitch using a 1/4″ seam.

8. Repeat for the lining but bring them to meet below the zip and stitch leaving a 3″ gap in the middle.

9. Open the zip to the middle! (Or you will need to do some unpicking later) Next you will need to stitch the top and bottom sides closed, attaching the split ring loop to the top.

10. Bring the zipper to the middle, aligning the outer and lining fabrics with the centre of the zip.

11. Stitch across the top, taking care to stitch slowly through the bulky seam.

12. Take the 2.5″ x 4″ piece of fabric and fold in thirds in to a skinny long piece and then in half creating a loop. Press well.

13. Insert the loop into the remaining edge, the top. Raw edges should be sticking out. Line it up with the centre of the zip. Stitch across carefully as the seam is bulky. Trim any excess fabric from the loop. Now turn it all the right way:

14. Reach through the 3″ gap in the lining and pull all the fabric through, reach through the open zipper and continue to pull the outer fabric through.

15. Poke your fingers into the corners and smooth out the lining inside. Smooth the outer and press well.

16. Using a ladder stitch or a small machine straight stitch in matching thread, close the 3″ gap.

Give it another press and voila! Your flat zipper pouch is ready to enjoy. Or gift! PS See that cute Dollar Bill Origami Shirt? You can make one too following these instructions. I haven’t made these in years. Not much fun now that our notes are all made of plastic!

Classes update

29 January, 2015 by admin 1 Comment

I’m so excited about the Chuck Nohara classes I’ll be teaching at Material Obsession this year.

There are twice monthly classes scheduled, the Saturday class is full but there are two spots still available in the Friday class which starts 13th Feb. Contact classes@materialobsession.com.au for further information.

The classes are loosely structured to accommodate the students’ needs. We will be working from Chuck Nohara’s book 2001 New Patchwork Patterns. This fabulous book is bulging with inspiration and ideas. Most block patterns are 2.25″ line drawings that leave the sizing and fabric selection up to the maker.

It really is a great quilt to explore your style and colour sense. I’m really looking forward to seeing all the beautiful projects ahead.

Below is my interpretation of Block #74. I’ve used several techniques to make this block, applique, reverse applique and machine piecing. How would you have approached it?

Holiday Hexies

25 January, 2015 by admin 2 Comments

Do you have a long term project you just pick up a few times a year? Something that’s purely therapeutic, mindless and there’s no end game?
I do! It’s purely for fun and has no deadline whatsoever. I’m calling it Blissful Abandon. Sounds a bit Mills & Boon doesn’t it?

I’ve been working on these 1″ fussy cut hexagons for over a year. I’m not in a rush as I’ve now worked out the longer it takes the more fabric I can include.

Fussy cutting is a pretty slow process, choosing the motif and then painstakingly cutting six identical shapes before stitching them over paper by hand.

Did I mention that it’s very relaxing? Highly recommend you give it a go 🙂

c. 2015 Lorena Uriarte