Tortilla Soup As Promised

This soup scored BIG with the husband and my pregnant-soup-loving-girlfriend Rachel - so you know it's good!

I'm so cheesy!  Pic from the cookbook -  it looked JUST like this - honest!

My mom and I based our soup on the recipe in the Vitamix cookbook but made modifications that I'll share below. 

Soup Base*:

2 Cups Vegetable Broth

2 Cups Water

3 Roma Tomatoes

6 Baby Carrots

2 Celery Stalks

1/4 Yellow Onion

2 Garlic Cloves

2 thin slices of Red Pepper

6 Mushrooms (crimini)

1 teaspoon Taco Seasoning

Dash of cumin (I ground my own from cumin seeds - a dash is all that's needed)

The Vitamix recipe called for a slice of cabbage and a slice of yellow squash - neither of which were available on our soup day.  Feel free to add - it can't hurt!

We made two batches of base - tasting the first to see what it needed for balance.  The ingredients/quantities above are the total numbers.   If you are not using a Vitamix or other high capacity blender, break the above ingredients into two batches. 

Place all base ingredients in your Vitamix (or other blender) and blend on high for 3-4 minutes, or until steam escapes from the vented lid.  

Optional Ingredients:

Crumbled Field Roast Mexican Chipotle Sausage (amount up to you - I was feeding omnivore husband so I made quite a bit of "sausage")

1 cup of fresh, frozen or canned Mexican Style corn

10 small pitted olives

1 1/2 cup of black beans

You can drop the optional ingredients in through the top and blend on Variable 1 for an additional 10 seconds OR move the base to the stovetop and add the options.  We added everything except for the olives but I think they would've made a nice addition. 

Top with Tortilla Strips:  Cut two corn tortillas into strips with a pizza cutter, spritz with a little non-stick spray and spice to taste.  Place in the oven at 350 until crispy - about 5 minutes. 

*You could easily never try this recipe because it seems wasteful to use such a small amount of each item.  In the two days following our Joint Soup Effort, I used the leftover tomatoes, onion and garlic to make salsa.  I combined the remaining mushrooms and black beans to make veggie burgers (froze the extras) and then roasted the remainder of the red pepper and added it to my tofu/broccoli stir fry.  All used.  All good.

Enjoy!