Chicken Tortilla Soup

Hopefully you are lucky enough to have some leftovers from the beer butt chicken! If you do, this is a snap to make this soup. If you added wood chips while grilling the chicken, the soup will have a wonderful smoky flavor to it.
  
Start by pulling the meat off the bones. Set the meat aside and place the bones in large pot and cover with water. Add a spoon or so of chopped garlic. Let the bones simmer for an hour to two hours. 

Carefully remove the bones from the broth, set aside. Strain any small bits of bone out of the broth by pouring into another pot through a sieve. Discard anything collected in the sieve. 

Pick any remaining meat off the bones and return the meat to the pot with the broth. Discard the bones.

Turn the broth back on to a low simmer. 

Chop up the chicken meat that was picked off the bones earlier and add this to the soup.

Add one can of Ro-Tel tomatoes, one can of chick peas (drained) and a little more chopped garlic. Also add 1 to 2 teaspoons of Cajun spice or just some salt and black pepper if you don't want your soup too spicy. I use a brand called Slap Ya Mama that I got in New Orleans but any will work.

Let the soup simmer until everything is heated through and the flavors start to blend, 30 minutes or so.

Ladle into soup bowls and enjoy!

If you like, you can garnish with chopped fresh green onion, 2 or 3 crunched up tortilla chips, a sprinkle of cheddar cheese or a small spoonful of light sour cream.