Chicken Tortilla Soup is a staple in my house any time of the year. It’s simple, healthy, and tasty! When I’m sick, I like to make it a little extra spicy to soothe my throat, or when it’s cold I love to hunker down with a big steaming bowl.
It’s a pretty customizable soup, you can add less corn, or more black beans, so on and so forth. For the chicken, I have always preferred using chicken tenders over breasts because they’re, well, more tender, but also easier to shred and tastier.
You can even make this soup vegetarian as well just by not adding the chicken. Since the chicken is added in at the end, you can split the batch into 2 parts if you’re feeding any vegetarians.
The soup goes great as an accompaniment to other dishes or as a main meal.
I don’t particularly like black beans in my soup so I choose not to add them more often than not. It’s included in the recipe ingredients but the soup is still super tasty without them.
Once you get to the stage where you dump all the canned goods in and it is time to add water to the pot, you can choose to add more or less water than the suggester 2.5 cups. Some people like a thicker soup and some like it more liquidy. If it’s being eaten as a side, I would suggest leaning towards using more water.
My favorite way to eat chicken tortilla soup is with some cheese, crushed tortilla chips, and avocado. Feel free to add some of those or none of those or even sour cream!
I hope you enjoy!
Click here to enjoy some of my other Mexican or Mexican inspired recipes! This soup is great paired with some quesadillas!
Chicken Tortilla Soup
Ingredients
Chicken
- 1 tray Boneless Skinless Chicken Tenders 6 – 7 tenders
- 2 Sprigs Cilantro chopped
- 1 Clove Garlic grated
- ¼ tsp Cumin
- ½ tsp Kosher Salt
- ¼ tsp Cayenne
- 1 tsp Olive Oil
Soup
- 2 Tbsp Olive Oil
- 2 Cans Creamed Style Corn
- 1 Can Petite Diced Tomatoes fire roasted if you can find them
- ½ Can Black Beans (optional)
- ½ Yellow Onion diced
- 2 Cloves Grated Garlic
- 3 Sprigs Chopped Cilantro
- 1 tsp Kosher Salt
- ¾ tsp Cayenne
- ¾ tsp Cumin
- 2½ Cups Water
- ½ Juice of Lime
Toppings
- Shredded Mexican Cheese
- Crushed Tortilla Chips
- Sour Cream
- Avocado
Instructions
Chicken
- Preheat oven to 400°
- Marinate Chicken with the cilantro, garlic, cumin, salt, oil, and cayene pepper for a minimum of 1 hour and maximum 24 hours.
- After marinading, bake for 15 minutes, flipping after 10.
- Once the chicken is cooked, place in a covered container. (Covering it will make it easier for it to shred)
- Shred chicken after it has cooled.
Soup
- Heat 2 Tbsp of oil in a medium to large pot and cook onions until slightly translucent.
- Add garlic, salt, cumin and cayenne to the pot and cook.
- Add all canned ingredients and 2.5 Cups of Water
- Cook on high flame until the soup simmers (don't cover)
- Add the chicken and salt to taste.
- Top with cilantro and juice of half a lime. Add optional toppings to your desire.
