Crock Pot Chicken Tortilla Soup

Mondays call for Crock Pots. They yearn for Crock Pots. They scream and dance and sing for Crock Pots. Granted, they also call (and sing and dance and scream) for coffee, and lots of it, but when it comes to dinnertime, Mondays were made for Crock Pots.

And the last day of September is made for soup. Granted, it was 75 degrees today (I hate South Carolina sometimes), but chicken tortilla soup sounded just too good to pass up. Especially Crock Pot chicken tortilla soup - the easier, the better. I came home at lunch to take the dog out to potty and throw everything in the Crock Pot, so when we got back from the gym we had a delicious meal already ready.

This was a stupidly easy recipe. It required minimal chopping and maximum dumping (sorry if that sounds gross, haha). I made several substitutions - the original recipe called for a serrano pepper, but since I couldn't find one at Trader Joe's, I didn't buy one. I didn't feel like driving around town just to buy a pepper. The recipe also called for chili powder, which I discovered we were out of. So instead I used two heaping 1/4 teaspoonfuls of red pepper flakes, 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper, and a generous grinding of the South African spice from Trader Joe's that we used on the pork tenderloin last night.

It all turned out really well. B said it could even be more spicy - next time, I'm pretty sure I'll add the serrano (or jalapeno, or whatever pepper I can find) pepper. However, we both really like spicy food, so if you prefer milder food I would just leave it out. I would also use a little less chicken broth. It was a little bit runny, but the flavor was fantastic.

You can see the original recipe here, or you can check out the patented Emily version below. Ole!

Crock Pot Chicken Tortilla Soup

Ingredients:
4 chicken breasts (frozen is fine)
1 15-ounce can sweet corn, drained and rinsed
1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes, drained (I used Trader Joe's fire-roasted organic tomatoes, and they were amazing).
5 cups chicken stock (I recommend 4)
1 small onion, diced
3/4 cup green pepper, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 hot pepper (serrano, jalapeno, etc), minced
1/2 teaspoon hot pepper flakes
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Trader Joe's South African spice grinder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Directions:
Dump ingredients in Crock Pot. Stir to mix.
Cook on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours.
An hour before serving, remove chicken breasts and shred. Return them to Crock Pot for an hour.
Serve soup with tortilla chips and shredded cheese (and a margarita, if you're lucky!)
Freeze leftovers for nights when you need a quick meal.