You may have already guessed by now but, if you couldn’t tell, I’m just a liiiittle bit food-obsessed. It only makes sense that I follow some awesome home chefs, here on WordPress, doesn’t it?! I found three dairy-free recipes, right on my Reader, and I needed to share them with you ASAP.
Smoked Sausage & Vegetables

Recipe found on In Dianes Kitchen
My Rating: 4 out of 5
My Review
If you aren’t already following Diane, you should be! She is constantly posting family-friendly recipes you’ll want to try. She is super supportive and so sweet, too. ❤
I almost always include a smoked sausage dinner in our weekly menu, they are one of my favorites and are ready-to-eat so quickly. The tomato sauce over everything was different and I quite liked it. It had a nice, simple flavor. Diane mentioned serving it over rice, which we didn’t do the first time, and regretted. When we reheated and served it over fettuccine pasta, it was 10x better.
Ingredients You’ll Need
- 13 oz. smoked sausage
- 1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp dry minced or2 cloves fresh garlic- 1 small onion, sliced
- 4 cups
frozenbroccoli - 1 large red bell pepper, sliced
(optional) - 8 oz. tomato sauce
- salt to taste
- pepper to taste
Easy Homemade Chili

Recipe found on BigAndPinkyToes
My Rating: 4.5 out of 5
My Review
I follow Lacey for her weekly fun, family updates; she doesn’t solely post recipes on her blog but, once in awhile… the blogosphere gets lucky. 🙂
I’m always looking for new chili recipes, even after we try a really good one, to one day, find the best one out there. There are some with way too little and there are some with just way too much. If you’re looking for that homemade flavor with no-frills… I’m telling you, this chili is it! Boyfriend tweaked a few things here and there (details below) but, oh my, this was yummy. Beefy, beany, semi-tomatoey… perfection.
Ingredients You’ll Need
- 1
-2 lbsground meat - 2 cups cooked kidney beans
or lentils - 1 28 oz can of diced tomatoes (we added about 1/4 can of tomato sauce, too, for more broth)
- 1 small onion chopped
- 3 cloves garlic minced (we added one smashed garlic clove)
- 1 Tbsp chili powder
- 1 tsp cumin
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- 1 dash
cayenne pepper(we didn’t realize we were out of cayenne pepper so we used red pepper flakes)
Ants In A Tree (Ma Yi Shang Shu)

Recipe found on Stephanie Ying’s blog, recipe we followed from Going My Wayz
My Rating: 3 out of 5
My Review
Stephanie recently started a new series (that I’m obsessed with) on her blog called, Food With My Dude, where she shares her and her husband’s cooking process for some of their dinners. I had never heard of “Ants In A Tree” before and the name scared me but, their pictures left me drooling.
There was a little spicy kick in the sauce that I highly appreciated. The pork cooked well and didn’t dry out. Boyfriend made a few changes (thanks to Stephanie’s suggestion), and it was the exact right amount of salty. My biggest complaint is there wasn’t enough sauce to completely cover my noodles, even after already doubling the recipe. Maybe because rice noodles soak it in faster than mung bean noodles do? I was also craving some type of veggie!!
Ingredients You’ll Need
- 4 1/2 ounces
mung bean noodles(we used thin stick rice noodles) - 2 ounces soy sauce (we used low-sodium)
- 1 tablespoon rice wine
- 1 tablespoon sambal chili paste
- 1 teaspoon cornstarch
- 10 ounces (1 package) ground pork
- 1 tablespoon canola oil
- 4 green onions, chopped, divided
- 1/2 cup chicken broth (we used No Salt Added)

I love Diane, she really is the best 🙂
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Isn’t she just?! ❤
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Ooh yummy! I really should follow some more food bloggers hehe! But I love reading your recipe reviews Hunida, and I love how you’re shouting out fellow bloggers here too! This is such a fun series because it means you get to create so many fun new dishes… I really need to experiment more! Thanks for sharing ❤️❤️❤️
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It’s hard to follow them all because I’m constantly hungry LOL. I’m so happy you enjoy these recipe reviews, Jennie. 🙂 It was fun using other bloggers’ recipes for a week & I love trying new dishes all the time! ❤ Thanks for reading!!
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i loveeeee chili & i’m always looking for new recipes! i love these posts & love that you’re a bit food obsessed lol 💛
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Yesss!! Chili is so good & perfect for the upcoming months. ❤ I hope you try Lacey's recipe & enjoy it as much as we did! Hehe, I'm so glad you're not annoyed by my food obsession! ❤
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I am going to read through all of your recipes and will do it soon!!! ❤
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Lol okay, love!!! ❤ Hope you enjoy!!!
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All three dishes look yummy, I loved the first one. No diary. It’s a great idea if I want something quick and easy
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Yes, they are all pretty quick & easy! I hope you enjoy it if you try it. 🙂
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All these recipes look so delish!
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They were!! 🙂
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As if your recipe reviews weren’t fun enough already, they just got even MORE fun!!!!
That first one from Diane is REALLY interesting! On first glance you would think “Just tomato sauce???” but then you think about how salty and smokey and flavorful the smoked sausage is so I can see how it would totally flavor-up the tomato sauce! I must try it immediately! We have all the ingredients in the house. (Claps hands with glee)
Chili!!! Yes! I could eat chili every day so I, too, am always looking for a new chili recipe to try.
I have to tell you two chili-related things. May I?
#1. My manager at an old job always made his own chili for his family for Christmas Eve. It was a family tradition. I got to join them one year and was curious to see a 1/2 of a peanut butter sandwich next to his bowl of chili. He explained that was from when he was a boy and refused to eat anything other than peanut butter. LOL Anyway, he also made his yummy chili (the secret ingredient is brown sugar) every year for our Halloween Potluck at work. Well, the poor guy. He took the train and subway to get to our Downtown Los Angeles office. One year he got off the subway and was coming up the second and last escalator of the subway station when he DROPPED the crockpot full of chili. All over the escalator. Luckilly he also had a put the extra chili in a small tupperware container and that was just enough for him to share with his favorite assistant, ME. Our other co-workers were out of luck that year.
#2 There used to be a restaurant in L.A. called Chili My Soul. Just a small little place. You walked in and had a choice of like 10 different chilis every day, ranging from a heat scale of 1 to 10. There were white chicken chilis and pork chilis and ground beef chilis and steak chilies and vegetarian chilis You name it. You could get samples of them before you decided on which one(s) you wanted. There were toppings to choose from as well. Then one year the owner died and none of his kids wanted to take over so that was the end of Chili My Soul. The entire city of Los Angeles was went through a period of mourning.
Anyway! I think I have all the stuff in the house to try Lacey’s chili this week, too!!!!
Unfortunately I don’t have any of the ingredients to try Stephanie’s recipe, but it sounds delicious so I will one day. I definitely want to check out her Food With My Dude series! How fun!
Thanks for sharing your blogger friends and their tasty recipes. I’m always looking for new meals to make for me and my Mom.
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Lol yay!! So happy you thought this was an even more fun post than usual. 😀 I thought the same about Diane’s recipe but it really did work– I highly recommend adding rice or pasta underneath when you make it!!
Thank you for sharing your chili stories, I am always open to hearing any stories you got!! 😀
I’m curious about the PB Sandwich, too. Did he dip it into the chili?! I totally pictured him dropping that chili, that’s something for a comedy film, my gosh!! How lucky that he ended up having a little just to share with you!! ❤ That was so sweet of him. I NEED to find a recipe with brown sugar in it now…
Let me know if you try Lacey's chili, it was really good! 🙂 & You're going to love Stephanie's Food With My Dude series!
It truly makes me so happy that you actually cook a lot of the meals we make! ❤ ❤
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Yah, I’m leaning towards rice for Diane’s recipe.
Thanks for tolerating my stories. LOL And no, he ate the sandwich separately. It was just a tradition to have both for the same meal. Something to do with him growing up super poor, I think. Unfortunately he died very suddenly a long time ago so i can’t ask him to tell me the story again. And man…his chili was THE BEST. I had to stop comparing other chilis to his and just accept other chilis on their own because that brown sugar is not a common ingredient so other chilis are simply not going to taste like his, ever.
But the world is full of delicious chilis, thank God, and I’m here to try them all!!! I’ll be sure to report back to you and Lacey when I make her recipe. I decided to make it on Sunday or Monday so I can have it for lunch all next week if Mom doesn’t like it.
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Good idea!!
I love your stories, Jinjer 😀 you may always share them with me!!
I am so sorry that the man passed away. I was going to ask if you could ask him for the recipe but, at least you always will remember him & best chili you ever had!
You are right though. The world is full of so many different delicious chilis. I’m still sad the spot in Cali closed down. 😦
I hope you & your mom both like the chili!!
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I loved the chili but Mom opted for a turkey sandwich. She was having tummy issues last week. She’s fine now.
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Aw, poor Momma. Glad her tum is feeling better now though. ❤
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TY!
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Hunida, my friend, you are awesome. I love your recipe reviews, but doing a post with recipes from fellow bloggers is such a fun idea. I sure appreciate you including mine🍽 Thank you❤️
And just like usual after reading your blog…. I’m hungry!
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Aw thank YOU for the amazing recipe, Lacey! ❤ So glad you thought this was a fun idea. 🙂
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I will definitely have to try some of these recipes! Diane’s recipe looks so yummy, and I absolutely love smoked sausage in any dish.Thank you for mentioning my dish; you’re so sweet! ♡ Although, I’ll have to make the chili for myself since someone [cough, cough, Stephen] doesn’t like kidney beans — which is such a shame, uhg. Ironically, we made our noodles for dinner and I would like to include more veggies in the dish, maybe start with the standard broccoli and carrot first so the taste isn’t altered as much? You’ve given me some more ideas. Thanks for sharing, and I hope your day is lovely!
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I hope you enjoy the other recipes if you do try them, Stephanie! 🙂 In Lacey’s recipe, she said you can use lentils instead of kidney beans if Stephen would prefer those! I really enjoyed your noodle dish. ❤ It was super flavorful but YES, broccoli & carrot would both be super satisfying in there. 🙂
Thank you for stopping by! I hope your day is lovely, too! ❤
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Thank you, I’ll have to keep that in mind! I’ll get him to eat it, or else he’ll just have to find his own dinner! Haha. WordPress didn’t let me know if someone replied to me. Sorry for the delay!
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No worries! WordPress is so annoying about the comments. They don’t keep track of them well at all & not to mention, I am human, & they freakin’ throw me into spam ALL day.
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Ah I love these recipes, thank you SO much for sharing them. Everytime I read these kind of posts, I feel more inspired to cook and try new things, more often than not I’m too lazy to do so haha, so thank you for this ❤ ❤
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Aw yay, so happy to inspire you, Marie!! ❤
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Those look amazing!I loved the “Ants in a tree” the most ,easy to make an vegetarian one ,just change the pork with soy pieces ,will definitely try it out!Thank you for the inspiration❤️💕
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The Ants in a Tree recipe would totally work with some soy pieces. 🙂 I hope you like it, Anna!!
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Girl, this is such a lovely thing of you to do. I love bloggers who support other bloggers. These dishes look delicious and interesting. My favorite one is the Ants in a tree one. I will have to try it out sometime. Thanks for sharing.
Much love always,
GABBY | http://www.gabbyabigaill.com
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Aw of course, I have to give credit where it’s due! I love my blogging friends. 😀 I hope you enjoy the dishes if you do try them! Thanks for stopping by! ❤
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OMG I really want to try the Ants in a tree recipe!! Looks soo good. Love the title of her series…. “Food with my Dude” sounds so cute!! lol
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It was really quite tasty 🙂 I hope you enjoy it, if you try it! I thought the title for her series was so cute, too!
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Ooh, I could use crumbled lightly smoked tofu in this instead of pork, with rice noodles I’ve got in the cupboard. What are green onions? And would rice wine vinegar do or does it need actual rice wine?
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You totally could use crumbled tofu instead of the pork! Green onions are the same as scallions or spring onions. 🙂 & yes, we actually used Rice Vinegar with no problems. I hope you like it if you try it, Chrissie!
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I love spring onions! Thanks 😊
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Sorry for all the questions hon!
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No worries at all! Ask away. 🙂
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Diane has some pretty amazing and super easy recipes! I will try a bunch of her recipes at some point.
I had never heard of ants on a tree but that actually looks interesting
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Doesn’t she?! We tried another one of hers this week. 🙂 The Ants in a Tree was pretty good & would work with ground chicken, too, since you are staying away from red meat!
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I want to try ground Turkey first lol. I havent had the chance to yet even though we’ve tried the Turkey franks, they’re so good! Lol
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We just had ground turkey today LOL what a coincidence!
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I made the chili for lunch and the smoked sausage for dinner. Both were deeeeeelicious! Thanks for sharing and linking us up to your cooking, blogging friends!
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Oh yay!! I’m so happy I could share them with you. I think you’ll really enjoy making a lot of Diane’s recipes. 🙂
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Yah, Diane makes a lot of yummy stuff! I’m on day 3 of that chili and my eyes are still rolling back in my head. How long is meat good for that has been thawed, cooked, leftovers frozen and then thawed and heated up in chili? LOL
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You can have leftovers for 4 days in the fridge but you should only be reheating the portion you will eat for the day so you are not reheating it ALL over & over again. 🙂
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Good to know! Thanks!
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Oh my goodness, how fun that all of these recipes were from fellow bloggers!! I love that you were using their recipes, what a great way to show support. ❤
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I had to give them a try!! & I wasn’t disappointed in any. 🙂
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I saved these recipes the chili I really want to try!❤️
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Oh you’re going to love it!! ❤
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I like the blandness of it . I’m not one for a spicy chili. 🙂
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