Tortilla Soup

12 oz of dry black beans
10 cups water
1 small pkg frozen corn (10 oz) or 1 can
olive oil enough to coat the bottom of your soup pot twice (4 tbs divided)
4 six inch corn tortillas
2 cloves of garlic
1/2 large onion (preferably purple for the color in the soup, but whatever)
1 or 2 serrano chile (pepper) depending on taste -- you can substitute jalapeno chiles, but you will get skins in your soup
Bunch of cilantro (about 1 inch in diameter)
1 can of diced tomatoes
1/2 lime
1 tbl cumin
1 32 oz box vegetable stock to keep it vegan/vegetarian
chicken or beef stock will also work
salt and pepper to taste

This recipe makes between 3 to 4 quarts of soup. I take it to all potlucks, with instructions.

THE NIGHT BEFORE
Put water and beans in a large preferably glass bowl let sit for at least 12 hours. I usually let it sit for nearly 24 hours.
Thaw the corn overnight in the refrigerator (if canned do nothing with it)

Prep time is about 45 minutes including allowing soup to simmer, depending on how fast you chop.

1) Heat your soup pot over medium heat
2) Drain and rinse the black beans, if they are not rinsed your soup will be dark purple or black, really gross looking. Allow beans to sit in the sink to continue draining
3) Add enough oil to your pot to coat the bottom
4) Cut the tortilla in to bite size pieces, triangles or rectangles and add to pot
5) Stir fry the tortilla pieces until lightly crunchy (lots of smoke don't worry), remove the tortilla chips from pot. Best if drained on paper towels
6) Drain the corn and discard the liquid
7) Add more oil to the pot to recover the bottom and add drained corn, stir occasionally so corn browns but not burns -- salted corn does not brown well, it has a tendency to burn
8) While the corn is browning, chop the garlic and onions and then add to corn, continue occasional stirring
9) While that is browning, chop serrano chiles (seeds have heat don't use if trying to control burn) and add to browning vegetables
9) Chop cilantro, but not so much that you can't tell there are leaves
10) By this time the vegetables in the pot should all be browned, add beans and continue occasional stirring
11) The beans do not need to brown just heat a little bit; you can add the tomatoes (with juice), cilantro, juice of the lime, cumin, and stock, continue cooking over medium heat
12) When the soup simmers add the crunchy tortilla pieces
13) Salt and pepper to taste. I don't usually add these when taking for a potluck, I feel that each person knows what they like for salt and pepper. Pepper will make the soup taste hotter

Serve with additional tortillas for dipping. Set out salsa, cheese, sour cream, guacamole, mole rojo, whatever you would use for quesadillas for floating on top of your soup

Number of Servings: 12

Recipe submitted by SparkPeople user AMLGOING.