Tomato Garlic Bread Soup + Tortilla Soup

The Tomato Garlic Bread Soup:

8 cloves garlic, chopped or pressed
1 whole cayenne pepper with stem trimmed off
½ C olive oil
2 ½ Lbs fresh tomatoes, diced
½ Tsp salt
Freshly ground pepper
4 cups stock (both chicken and vegetable works well)

1. Heat olive oil on medium.
2. Add garlic and cayenne pepper. 
3. Add tomatoes, basil*, mint, salt, pepper and stock. Cook on medium-high for 20 minutes, then turn down to low, add bread and cover for 20 minutes. Let stand for one hour before serving.

*if you are out of fresh basil, you can throw in a cube or two of frozen pesto.

Alternative: Tortilla Soup

This base also makes an amazing tortilla soup! We added 1.5 lbs of chicken breast to the pan after the garlic and cayenne pepper, let it brown for about 5 minutes, then continued with the rest of the recipe as listed above. Substitute ¼ Cup cilantro for the basil and mint. Leave out the bread and top with tortilla chips when ready to serve.