Grilled Vegetable Tortilla Soup

If you have the time and you feel like being organized, you can grill these vegetables before making another grilled meal, then have the soup the next day. If you want to serve it immediately, give yourself a couple of hours to complete the soup. Most of that time will be waiting for the coals to light or the vegetables to cook. 

This goes out to No Croutons Required. This month's theme is zucchini. Yay, zucchini!

5/13/2011 It has recently come to my attention that Heather at Girlichef has a serious Tortilla Soup addiction. She has been running an event all year collecting recipes. Heather, don't miss this one, it's a keeper! It was the last thing I grilled last season and the first for this one. It also deserves a place in this month's House Favorites roundup.

Grilled Vegetable Tortilla Soup

2 ears corn
2 poblano peppers
1 sweet onion, such as a 1015 or Vidalia
1 pound zucchini
4 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
1 16-ounce can of fire-roasted diced tomatoes
4 cups vegetable broth
2 limes (1 for juice, 1 for garnish)
salt and ground cumin to taste
tortilla chips
2 small Hass avocados, diced

Remove husk from corn. Cut poblanos into strips. Slice onion, cut slices in half, and separate the rings. Cut zucchini into 1/2 inch slices. Thinly slice garlic cloves. Toss poblanos, onion, zucchini and garlic together with soy sauce and olive oil, then add cumin seeds and toss again.

Grill vegetables in your largest grill pan, over medium-hot coals until tender. Set aside to cool slightly. Dice peppers, onions and zucchini. Slice corn kernels from the cobs. Toss the vegetables into a pot with tomatoes, vegetable broth and lime juice and heat through. Taste for salt and cumin. (I added just 1/4 teaspoon cumin and no salt, since my vegetable broth was made from Massel, which is salty.)

To serve, place a handful of crushed tortilla chips into 6 bowls. Ladle on soup and top with diced avocado and a few whole tortilla chips. Slice lime into 6 wedges and add one to the rim of each bowl.

Serves 6