Easy Chicken Tortilla Soup Recipe

Your family will love this easy chicken tortilla soup recipe! It’s chunky, hearty, and really easy to control the level of spiciness. This soup was a BIG hit with our family, so much so that I now make a double batch. Even the one year old and three year old ask for seconds!

When people hear that I’m a recipe developer and food photographer, they tend to think that I create extravagant, complicated dishes that they would find at a fancy restaurant. While that’s sometimes fun for me, the truth is that I come from very humble beginnings, and I kind of like to stick to them.

Between being my being homeless for a time, and then living off of a $100 a month food budget for our first year of marriage, I got really good at using simple, affordable ingredients, to create hearty and healthy meals. This easy chicken tortilla soup is that kind of recipe.

The soup is ready in about 45 minutes, with very little hands on time, and it combines really simple ingredients into a flavorful bowl of healthy comfort food.

If you have a family like mine, with a mix of different levels of spicy tolerance, I have an easy secret for meeting everyone’s needs.

Start with just the 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper and let it cook the 20-30 minutes. Then divide the soup based on how many people do or don’t want spicy. I pull out four baby/toddler sized servings and let them cool for the two kids. Then add some more cayenne pepper to the rest of the soup and cook it another 5 minutes, stirring the whole time to get consistent flavor and prevent burning.

Also, the photos show cheese and avocado on top of the soup, but you can absolutely skip them to make this a dairy free recipe. They are not included in the nutritional .

Do you have a favorite soup recipe that makes your kids beg for more? We’d love to have you share it in the comments!

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EASY CHICKEN TORTILLA SOUP RECIPE

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Yield: 6 servings

Easy Chicken Tortilla Soup Recipe

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This easy chicken tortilla soup recipe is true comfort food. Ready in under 1 hour, & you control the amount of heat. You can save time be buying pre-cooked and chopped or shredded chicken, or save money by cooking and chopping your own. Either way, you'll make this soup again and again! From food.com, used with permission.

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 40 minutes

Total Time 55 minutes

Ingredients

• 6 tablespoons coconut oil, or vegetable/canola oil
• 8 corn tortillas, chopped
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 cup chopped cilantro
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1 ounce can diced tomatoes, 28
• 2 tablespoons ground cumin
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 3 leaves bay
• 8 cups chicken stock
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon 1 cayenne pepper
• 4 large cooked chicken breast halves, shredded or chopped
• shredded cheese and chopped avocado, optional

Instructions

1. In dutch oven, or large heavy bottomed soup pot, heat the oil over medium high heat.
2. Add the tortillas, garlic, cilantro and onion, stirring and cooking for 2-3 minutes.
3. Add the tomatoes, and bring to a boil.
4. Add cumin, chili powder and bay leaves.
5. Add chicken stock and return to a boil.
6. Add salt and cayenne and continue boiling for 20-30 minutes, until thick. Stir occasionally, making sure nothing burns at the bottom of the pot.
7. Remove bay leaves and stir in shredded chicken.
8. Garnish with shredded cheese and avocados if desired.

Notes

Approximate cost/serving: This is cheapest if you get your chicken breasts in bulk, and use homemade chicken stock. That's what we did and it came out to about $9 for the recipe, so just $1.50 per serving.

Gluten free: Just make sure your corn tortillas are gluten free, as well as any pre-shredded cheese if you use some.

Nutrition Information:

Yield:

6

Serving Size:

6 servings
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 407Saturated Fat: 14.17gSodium: 775.33mgCarbohydrates: 26.32gFiber: 5.05gSugar: 5.9gProtein: 34.07g

More Tortilla Soup Recipes from Food Blogging Friends:
Slow Cooker Chicken Tortilla Soup from The Adventure Bite
Turkey Tortilla Soup from Simply Recipes
Spicy Vegetarian Tortilla Soup from Joy the Baker