Parsnip and sweet potato soup and other soups

I love soup and I was inspired by this combination of vegetables in labelga's post on March 6.
My basic method for soup is: fry chopped vegetables for a few min in oil or butter, add boiling water, bring to the boil. Then lower the heat and let the soup simmer for about 10 min. Not longer, unless the vegetables are not cooked yet. Then mix it with a hand mixer.
This is the method of my mother's housekeeper. She used butter. I usually use olive oil - or sunflower oil when I use Asian spices - but butter tastes nice once in a while. I remember her endives (witloof) soup, delicious! The trick in this recipe is not to boil the soup for very long, so the vegetables keep their flavour.
When my vegetables are about to go off, I often throw them into a soup.

Sweet potato and parsnip soup



1 small onion
2 medium parsnips, peeled and diced
1 big sweet potato, peeled and diced
some leftover lettuce
1 dried small chilli pepper, chopped finely
1/2 tsp ground cumin
vegetable stock
1 tsp butter

Heat the butter and fry the onion and chilli pepper in it on low to medium heat. After 1-2 min add parsnips and sweet potato and cumin. After a few more min add the lettuce and let this shrink a bit. Then add boiling water, stock and salt. Bring to the boil then lower the heat and let the soup simmer for about 10 min. Mix it with a hand mixer.

I served the soup with sour cream and chopped parsley.

Pumpkin, endives and red pepper soup

This was a combination I once made at a friend's with her leftover vegetables. It turned out really well.
I used these ingredients:

1 small pumpkin, peeled and chopped
2 endives, washed and chopped
1/2 red pepper, chopped
2 onions, peeled and chopped
2 small potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 tsp sugar
2 bay leaves
"herbes de Provence"
olive oil
vegetable stock
pepper & salt

Broccoli and fennel soup

This was another successful combination.

1 onion
1 sprig of broccoli
1 fennel
olive oil
fennel seeds