Taste Of India

Mexican Tortilla Soup

You think Mexican, you think Tortillas (pronounced as Tortias). The cuisine is extensively built around the tortilla, be it corn , flour or wheat tortilla and various dishes are made in various forms using the tortilla. One of their well known soup is of course - the Tortilla Soup. Mostly chunks of non-veg is added along with vegetables simmered in either beef/chicken stock and garnished with avocado and fried tortilla strips with lots of cilantro.

I have made a vegetarian version and since I believe in making everything from scratch for the purpose of eliminating unwanted preservatives, sodiums and sugars, I have not used tinned stuff ( call me paranoid! cos I think I sure am :)). But for a quick meal you can go for tinned ingredients too.

Ingredients

1 onion, chopped
4-5 garlic cloves, minced
1 jalapeno pepper, sliced thinly ( use as per hotness level reqd.)
1 tbsp cumin seeds
1 cup corn kernels ( frozen works fine )
1/4 cooked Kidney beans , soaked overnight (or use canned kidney beans)
6 medium sized Tomatoes ( or use one can Tomatoes - fire roasted variety is what makes the taste scrumptious )
1 avacado, pitted and sliced into cubes
1-2 corn tortillas , stale works best ( good reason to make this soup when you have stale corn tortillas left over!)
5 cups water/ vegetable stock
some lime wedges and cilantro for garnish
salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Cut the tomatoes in half, brush some olive oil and bake in an Oven at 375F for 10-15min until you see liquid starting to ooze out of the tomatoes. Note This step is to be skipped if you are using Canned tomatoes.

2. Cool them for 2-3 min and then peel the skin from the tomatoes and chop them coarsely.

3.Next heat some Olive oil in a pan and add the cumin seeds along with onions, garlic and chilli. Saute for 3-4 min.

4.Then add the corn, tomatoes and kidney beans and cook for another 1 min.

5.Add the water/stock and simmer for 5-10min with a closed lid. Season with salt and Lots of pepper and in simmer in low heat for another 5min.

6.Meanwhile cut the corn tortiall in strips ( usually thin, I wanted little bigger ).

Note It helps if the tortiallas are dry without any moisture since it helps to reduce Oil intake while frying. But incase of using a relatively fresh tortilla jus bake them for 1-2 min in an oven till it gets dry.

7.Fry them in batches in oil till lightly golden.