The Best Tortilla Soup EVER

I had some fun over the weekend... And I got to cook. Here's The Apostles grooving on the stage at the Oakhurst Globe Trot.

Oh, and if you ever want to play music for a charity event for free in front of a restaurant (The Matador) that is profiting off of sales you bring in. Don't expect to be fed or given any beer or sodas. Suffice it to say they are not musician friendly it is recommended that you avoid this place. Sorry, had to rant. Otherwise the show was pretty fun :)

This is an adaption of Eva Longoria's tortilla soup. It's pretty obscure and I had to make some improvements to the presentation. Anyway this stuff is pretty awesome. I'll be making it again REAL soon so get your spoons ready.

Tortillia Soup

You will need

• 1 roasted chicken I usually get the Mojo variety from publix
• 2 carrots
• 2 onions
• 2 stalks celery
• Some fresh garden chilis. Pick a couple hot and a couple medium eg. 2 jalapenos, 2 poblano 
• 4 tomatoes the freshest reddest most delicious that you can find
• 4 Cloves garlic
• 2 Qt Chicken Stock
• 1 bunch fresh cilantro
• Oil for Frying
• Corn tortillias
• 2 avacados
• Sour cream
• salt/pepper

 So I'm a big fan of making my own stocks, which is probably why I'm more of a fan of soups than most people. They just tend to taste better with fresh stock.

So get you carrots and celery and onion. AKA Mirepoix so you can sound fancy.

Fill that pot up with some water and wash the veggies break them into a few smaller pieces and toss them in. Don't worry about trimming or peeling except for maybe the onions as dirt can get in the roots and under the skin. 

Wash your hands and pull all the meat of the bones of that chicken that you picked up. Throw the bones and skin into the pot with the veggies and let that go for about an hour. 30-45 will be ok if you are in a hurry. It will look not very appetizing. Like so.

Or you could go buy some stock. 

While that's going on you can prep up some of the other things that will go into the soup. Depending on the heat of the chilis that you have you may want to blanch them to remove some of the heat.

Once you do that combine the tomatoes onion chili's and garlic in a food processor. Spin Wheeeeeeeeee. Till everything is blended. If it's thick add a splash of chicken stock. (or pepper stock (see above) if you're adventurous)

Throw the blended mixture into a pot along with your beautiful fresh chicken (2 quarts) stock and let that simmer and share flavors for about 30 minutes.
OK. You've got 30 minutes to kill at this point so why not prepare the tortilla part of the tortilla soup.

You need to heat up some oil in a pan. About an inch, inch-and-a-half should do it. Heat that up to around 300-350 degrees and add some tortilla strips. How do I make tortilla strips you ask? Just cut the corn tortilla into strips and ta-da!

Drop them in but not all of them. It took me 5 batches or so to get them all. Otherwise you are going to be looking at a big oily mess all over your stove. You can remove the strips when they turn golden brown and stop bubbling. Place them on a plate with paper towels on top.

OK after the chicken broth/veggie combo has done it's thing you can toss in the cilantro, Chop up the bunch roughly stems are fine in this recipe and may even add a little of extra texture to the dish.

The soup will be done 5 minutes after you add the cilantro so it's time to plate. (this is the cool part)

Start with some chicken in the bottom of the bowl.

Add 2 slices of lime and 2 heafty slices of avocado and some black pepper.








Next come the tortilla strips and sour cream
And this is how it should look if you are cooking for guests. Bring out the soup separately and Gently ladel around the edegs of the dish.



I know I already showed you this picture but I think we need to see it again after this super long post.

Yum.

Note. If you keep the ingredients separated into containers you can do like I did and enjoy this same dish a couple of lunches in a row.