Tortilla Soup

Boil your chicken breasts to make your chicken stock (as long as you prefer, depending on how rich you like your stock). You should wind up with about 4 cups of stock when you’re finished.

Remove chicken breasts and pull off all skin and bones.

Shred chicken.

To the stock, add the can of tomatoes, black beans, corn, and shredded chicken.

Add garlic and onion.

Add cumin, chili powder, cilantro, cayenne pepper, salt, and black pepper.

Bring to a boil and reduce heat to simmer.

Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 425.

Grab those tortillas and spray each side with cooking spray (like Pam) as you place them in a stack.

Cut into strips.

Now you’re going to need a baking sheet and some oven safe cooling racks (you know, the kind you use to put your cookies on to cool after you bake). You’ll be setting the cooling racks on the baking sheet and laying the tortilla strips over them. The idea is to get them elevated so that the heat can circulate all around them and you won’t have to flip them halfway through. This is the same method I use with my Homemade Tortilla Chips .

Bake your tortilla strips for 8-10 minutes or until the edges are golden brown. (You may need 2 sheets to make this many).

Remove from oven and sprinkle with salt.

Now the soup should have been simmering for half an hour or so by now. Just long enough for the flavors to mellow out and meld (you could, of course, do this in a crock pot on low for about 4 hours if you have your stock already made).

Dish it up, top with sour cream, cheddar cheese, slices of avocado, and the tortillas.

Bon appetite!