Tan Lines & Wine: It’s Bachelor Monday!!

Happy Monday everyone! I hope you had a great weekend, I know we sure did! I am so excited for tonight’s episode, can’t wait to see who Prince Farming takes out on the first round of dates! But first, here’s a recap of how we spent our weekend!

Friday night, with a ton of help from Mr Tan Lines I made steak skewers over quinoa with a chimichurri sauce! Everything was really easy to make, here’s what you’ll need:

1 lb steak, cut into 1-inch cubes

1 green bell pepper

1 orange bell pepper

1 red bell pepper

1 medium white onion

Salt & pepper

For the chimichurri sauce you’ll need:

1 cup flat leaf parsley

1/2 cup fresh cilantro

5 cloves of garlic

1 tbs crushed red pepper flakes

1/4 cup red wine vinegar

Juice if 1/2 a lemon

1 tsp dried oregano

1/4 white onion

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/2 tbsp kosher salt

1 tsp black pepper

And here’s what I did:

Cut the steak, bell peppers and onion into similar 1-inch cubes, skewer onto skewer sticks (we have metal ones we purchased from Bed, Bath & Beyond). If you use wooden skewers make sure to soak them in water for 10-15 minutes before you add your meat and veggies. Drizzle olive oil over the skewers and sprinkle with salt & pepper. Grill for 10-15 minutes. You can also do these on the stove or even bake them, up to you!

For the chimichurri sauce take everything I listed above and throw into a blender, blend it up! Super simple! The chimichurri sauce is seriously delicious! It was really spicy though, if you want to eliminate some of the heat don’t add the red pepper flakes and use 3 garlic cloves instead of 5.

Serve over your favorite quinoa and enjoy!!

We paired ours with this (hands down one of my favorite wines ever) cabernet sauvignon from my local Earthfare. Earthfare is a new mecca I discovered upon moving to South Carolina. It’s similar to Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods, they offer the same organic, healthy food options as well as hot pre-made meals and a large salad bar. I purchased this wine for $9, a real steal considering how delicious it is. It was one of the smoothest wines that I have ever had, the flavor was delicate and nomlicious! I can’t wait to go back and buy more!

On Saturday I started off my day at the spa! Mr Tan Lines purchased a mini spa package for me for Christmas and it was finally time to cash it in! I got a facial, hand & foot massage with hot chocolate and a full body hot stone massage…it was amazing and so relaxing!

After I got home we spent most of the day lounging around the house and I went through about 6 episodes of Pretty Little Liars, it’s getting so good! It was a much needed “let’s not do anything” day and we both really enjoyed it. In the evening we couldn’t decide where to do date night so we gave into my wing craving and went to our local Buffalo Wild Wings; they really do have the best wings! We watched some football and I was happy to see the Ravens lose, but was then sad to see the Panthers lose as well!

We then went home and watched some tv, hung out with our favorite puppy and cracked open this delicious bottle of merlot. I actually purchased this one from Wal*Mart for $8, can’t beat those prices! It was really good and we both enjoyed it.

Sunday we tried to run outside but it was just so cold! Instead we went to the little gym in our neighborhood and got a nice work out in. Sunday night I made a dish I’ve been antsy to make for a while now; Peruvian chicken with an aji verde sauce and yucca fries! The aji verde sauce recipe I followed must have been wrong because it was SO spicy, like you can’t even eat or breathe it spicy so I had to add quite a bit more of some stuff to make it edible, I put my revised ingredients list below!

For the chicken marinade here’s what you’ll need:

1 whole chicken

1 cup beer (I used Corona)

1/4 cup white vinegar

Juice of 1 lime

2 tsp cumin

2 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp salt

1 tsp black pepper

Mix all of the ingredients in a small bowl. Place chicken into a large bowl and pour marinade on top. Let sit for 1-2 hours (or overnight if you can).

Once it’s done marinating cut the chicken in half, place into baking dish skin side up and bake for 1.25 – 1.5 hours at 425 degrees. The last 10 minutes I switched to broil in order to crisp up the skin.

For the aji verde sauce here’s what I used:

2 jalapeños (original recipe called for 3)

3 tbsp fresh cilantro

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil (original recipe called for 2 tbsp)

2 garlic cloves

1 tbsp white vinegar

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp kosher salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

1 cup sour cream (the original recipe only called for 2 tbsp’s)

Put everything into a blender and you guessed it, blend! Serve on the side or pour on top of the chicken.

As for the yucca fries here’s what I did. I purchased a fresh yucca root but I would recommend buying it frozen if you can (I couldn’t find it anywhere). The skin is hard to get off but is a must, you cannot eat the skin. Cut the yucca into 2 inch pieces and remove all of the skin. Boil for 45 minutes. Cut into “fry sized” pieces. In a deep pot put 1 cup of vegetable oil and heat. Place the yucca into the oil once it’s hot and fry until golden brow. Voila!

The chicken was delicioussssssss Mr Tan Lines couldn’t get enough! I shredded what we didn’t eat and plan to make chicken salad with it for lunch tomorrow! We paired our meal with this yummy merlot that I purchased at Publix, again it was a great price $9 and had a great taste!