Using the off-shell formulation for general N = 2 supergravity-matter systemsdeveloped in arXiv:0905.0063, we propose a construction to generate arestricted chiral superfield from any real weight-zero projective multiplet L.One can choose L to be composed of tensor multiplets, O(2n) multiplets, withn=2,3,..., and polar hypermultiplets. In conjunction with the standardprocedure to induce a N = 2 linear multiplet from any chiral weight-one scalar,we obtain a powerful mechanism to generate higher-derivative couplings insupergravity. In the case that L is a homogeneous function of n tensormultiplets of degree zero, we show that our construction is equivalent to thatdeveloped by de Wit and Saueressig in arXiv:hep-th/0606148 using the componentsuperconformal tensor calculus. We also work out nontrivial examples with Lcomposed of O(2n)and tensor multiplets.