Chicken Tortilla Soup - YUM

I made the Pioneer Woman's Chicken Tortilla Soup last night. It was a cold, cold day in Texas (yes, they do happen) and soup sounded like just what I needed. Ree just posted the recipe on her site, so I took it as a sign from above that it was meant to be... and it was.

I would copy and paste the recipe here, but I'm afraid that there might be some copyright issues, and I don't want Ree mad at me. I've heard she has quite a temper. She is a redhead after all. Okay so I haven't heard that, but it makes for a better, more interesting post.

Okay, enough with the rambling. Let's get down to business. As I said before, it was a brisk day in Dallas so I bundled up and headed to Kroger to purchase my ingredients. So needless to say, these prices are based on Kroger prices in Dallas. Depending on where you shop you may spend more or less. Also, there were a few items that I already had on hand - the Olive Oil, garlic powder, garlic, and salt (I would have to forfeit my Italian card if i didn't have these ingredients in my home). With the ingredients that I purchased it worked out to about $4.58/serving. According to PW this recipe makes 8 servings. We have already had 5 servings of it and judging by the Tupperware containers taking over the fridge, we probably have at least another 5 servings to go.

Now down to the recipe. I used three chicken breasts instead of two. I'm such a rebel. What would PW think of me? I like my soup a little chunky and extra chicken won't hurt a thing.

PW says you need 1 cup of diced onion - that's about 1/2 of a regular sized onion. She also says that you need 1/4c of each green bell pepper and red bell pepper. That's like 1/4 of the pepper. I don't know about you but if I only use 1/4 of a pepper, I will put the unused 3/4 back in the fridge and I won't see it again until it has become somewhat of a science experiment. So to save the red pepper and onion from this horrible fate, I just used the whole thing. Yes, the whole thing. That's way more pepper and onion than the recipe calls for but channel your inner James Dean and you'll be glad you did. As for the green pepper, well that got stuck in the fridge because i'm not particularly fond of green pepper and i didn't want to overwhelm the soup with that green pepper flavor. I'm sure it will haunt me from beyond the grave, but I'm okay with that.

The recipe calls for 32oz of Chicken Stock. I used around 40oz because I had some left in the fridge from another recipe. As for everything else, I did as I was told.

If you follow her recipe you really can't mess anything up. This recipe is really pretty easy and there wasn't anything that was difficult to follow. Plus she always puts up really pretty pictures so if you ever get confused by anything you have a visual aid to help you. Lots and lots of visual aids. I really don't know how she has time to make up a recipe, cook the recipe, take pictures of every step of the recipe, and then BLOG about it. She must have super powers. I want super powers.

Feel free to make the recipe your own as I did, but please, please, please don't skimp on the toppings! They are the most important part. So ladle that soup in a bowl, put on a dollop of sour cream, add some cheese, red onion and lots of cilantro and Voila you have a little taste of heaven. When you're done, go ahead and lick the bowl. You know you want to. Don't worry I won't judge.