Tortilla Soup

Alice Waters: The Art of Simple Food; Day 10; Recipe 15

Paul brought home the largest chicken breast i have ever seen (from Whole Foods, so it was not on steroids) and as a result this soup was really chock full of chicken.  It also had tomatos, onion, garlic and jalapeno pepper.  It was supposed to have an anaheim pepper instead, but we couldn't find one.  Because I can't take as much heat as Paul can I only put in half the pepper, and the broth was just right for me.  Paul on the other hand thought that using the whole pepper would have brought more flavor.  The broth could have been better in other ways too, more flavorful, more robust perhaps, but this sort of problem can occur when one uses store-bought broth rather than homemade.  We topped the soup with tortilla chips, again, store bought because Paul mistakenly bought wheat tortillas, and we had to make a last minute substitution.  As far as i am concerned the chips worked well.  We also garnished the soup with queso fresco, cilantro, and stirred in some lime juice, which really boosted the flavor.  The soup was good, but fell just short of a true success.  With a little tweaking we could do better next time.