10 Weeks of Soup - Week One: Healthy Pork Tortilla Soup

Remember that 10 week weight loss challenge I told you I committed to earlier in the week? Well my theory is I need to eat lots of soup! Soup imparts a warming, comforting feel that makes you feel well fed even if you didn't consume a lot of calories. Under the Weight Watcher program, broth counts for zero points. Obviously you can jack up the calorie load pretty easily with ingredients like cream and cheese. But, if you stay clear of these 'weight loss evils', or at least use sparingly, you'll be able to create some really healthy soups.

For each of the next 10 weeks I will give you ideas for healthy satisfying soups. I'll at least post one soup a week and some weeks more. I've got a few really interesting ones up my sleeve. (what? sauerkraut in soup? you'll see...)

For week one I thought I'd share the soup we enjoyed earlier in the week. There really aren't tortillas in this soup but I used corn flour to impart the flavor of tortillas. Now be sure you are using corn flour and not corn starch. Corn flour is a finer ground version of corn meal. If you don't have or can't find corn flour use corn meal.


Healthy Pork Tortilla Soup
Servings - 5, WW pt/serving - 4
6 cups of pork broth (if you can't find pork broth - chicken broth will work fine)
1 1/2 cups lean cooked pork
1 can of red beans - drained and rinsed
1 can of sweet white corn - drained and rinsed
1/4 cup of corn flour
1 1/2 cup celery - diced
1 1/2 cup onion - diced
1 1/2 cup carrots - diced
2 chipolte in adobe sauce - finely minced
1 tbsp olive oil
2 green onion - cut into slices
1/2 cup of cilantro - chopped

Chop the celery, onions, and carrots into small diced pieces.

Chop or pull the cooked pork into small pieces.

In a soup pot on medium heat, heat the olive oil and saute the celery, onion, and carrots with 1 tsp of salt. The salt will help pull liquid from the vegetables to aid in cooking. Saute for about 5 minutes. Stir in the corn flour and cook for another minute. Add in the remaining ingredients and let simmer for about a half an hour.

Garnish with cilantro and green onion slices.