Lately I have had a real craving for those tex mex style restaurants. For the longest time I could not handle anything remotely spicey. Then suddenly without warning, one day my body built up a tolerance to hot foods. Things I was never able to even take a bite of before started becoming cravings! I tried buffalo wings for the first time ever this year, now I eat them regularly, the hotter the better.

Chile peppers, tabasco sauce, habanero, I love it all now!

One thing I love tatsing out tex mes eateries are the soups. A fan of making soup and stew as fall and winter start rolling in, it was only a matter of time before I got on with making a soup like Chicken Enchilada Soup.
I got this recipe off of a website calle AllRecipes.com. Below is the original version from the site. This was my base for creating my meal.

Ingredients
1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
1 (15.25 ounce) can whole kernel corn, drained
1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes including juice
1 (14.5 ounce) can chicken broth
1 (10 ounce) can enchilada sauce
1 (4 ounce) can diced green chiles
1 white onion, chopped
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
2 bay leaves
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper, or to taste
Directions
1.Rinse and pat dry the chicken breasts, then place into the bottom of a slow cooker. Add the corn, tomatoes, chicken broth, enchilada sauce, green chiles, onion, cilantro, bay leaves, garlic, cumin, chili powder, salt, and black pepper.
2.Cook on Low for 6 hours. Transfer the chicken to a large plate, then shred the meat with two forks. Return the chicken to the slow cooker and continue cooking for 30 minutes to 1 hour.

Now I followed this recipe completely ingredient wise. The only subtle change I made was instead of buying chicken breast, I bought chicken breast tenderloin. They are already cut into thin strips and cooked down in such a way where I never had to remove the chicken from the soup to fork shred it. The chicken shredded itself! Also i did not use a crock pot. I used a regular old large pot on my stove top. I kept the heat on low and alternated keeping the lid on and removing the lid when the heat was too much. The objective being to keep the soup at a constant simmer for about 6 hours.
The stock became so thick and cooked down that my boyfriend Matt had to keep adding water. He took over the soup vigilence while I went to work. But he said he even went out and ran a few errands while it slowly prepared itself. In this respect this was one of the easiest meals I have ever prepared.
Tatsing it was an experience. This soup could easily rival the ones in the restaurants. It will for sure become a regualr dish in my house! A hint of spicey, a blast of rich flavor from the cumin and chili powder.

It was TOTAL comfort food

. I wanted to be eating this as a means to get warm, or to cheer up after a bad day.
I garnished the soup with a handful of finely shredded mexican cheese. After tasting, I think it would be best to add something like olive oil or butter to the base of this soup. Also a twist of lime juice would have really brought out the flavor of the cilantro. My only concrete complaint about the original recipe was that there just wasn't enough. The recipe yeilds six servings. Maybe with a slow cooker that is true, but stove top, I got about 3 good size bowls out of it total.

For a family meal, be sure to double your quantities!

Bon apetite!
*originally published on 9/4/11 in my cooking blog My Kitchen Go Boom.