Recipe Savers: Chicken Enchilada Soup

Over the past 9 months we have dramatically reduced our grocery budget by shopping at Aldi... so much so, I've started to share my recipes, secrets and tips in a new feature called Recipe Savers.

This recipe comes from a blog I found via Pinterest when I was searching for new recipe ideas! I give you Lil' Luna's Crock Pot Green Chile Enchilada Soup which has become an absolute staple in our house.

I make a batch up, we eat dinner and then we FREEZE these in Tupperware containers, making a quick and awesome lunch for busy mornings. I've Mild-Out the flavors because we have a toddler at home, and lately he hasn't really felt like eating this meal, but i'm happy to feed him a quesadilla when we make this just to stock our freezer up!

I will admit, I've modified her recipe a little adding in more corn and rice because its just easier to use a whole can then less, but either way you follow it, its amazing and people tell me it smells soooooo good when I heat it up at work.

Instead of canned Green Chile sauce, I use this recipe from Mel's Kitchen. I've roasted my own green chili's before and it made it to die for...  but with a toddler, i just don't have the time to roast and peel these suckers and end up using the canned green chili's instead. For my Recipe and math below, you need a double batch of Mel's sauce mixture.

So how much does it cost to make? $14.92 at Aldi for 16 servings... $0.93 each... 

Sauce:

• 1 Cup of Chopped Onion ($0.25)
• 4 garlic cloves ($0.25 / Whole minced jar is $2.19 so this is generous price estimate)
• 6 tablespoons Flour ($0.05)
• 1/2 teaspoon Cumin (estimate $0.10 / Whole jar is $1.19)
• 1/2 a teaspoon Oregano (estimate $0.10 / Whole jar is $1.19)
• 1 teaspoon Salt (too cheap to count)
• 3 Cups Chicken Broth ($0.25, using this homemade version)
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper (too cheap to count)
• 4 cans of Green Chili ($0.55 each / $2.10 Total)
• 4 tablespoons of Oil: $0.20

Soup:

• 4 chicken breasts, cooked and shredded (about 2/3 a family packet at Aldi) $6.50
• 28 oz Chicken Broth already factored in above...
• Green Chili Sauce from above
• Cumin (already factored in above for an extra 1.5 tablespoons)
• Chili Powder (estimate $0.10 / Whole jar is $1.19)
• Onion Powder (estimate $0.10 / Whole jar is $1.19)
• Garlic Powder (estimate $0.10 / Whole jar is $1.19)
• Can of Corn (I use a whole can in mine) $0.49
• Rice - I just cook 1/2 cup to 1 cup of dry rice on the stove top and drop it in ($0.15)
• Cream cheese - $1.29
• (I don't add additional green chili's to the recipe), but if you want it spicy you can add $1.10)
• Block of Cheese to shred and top soup with: $2.89

It's just flat out tasty folks... 

Check out my other Recipe Saver Ideas:

$0.65 breakfast burritos 
$0.93 Broccoli Bacon Cheese Soup 
$1.27 Chicken Alfredo Bundles
$8.30 Double Crust Chicken Pot Pie (Serves 8)