Roasted Vegetable Soup

Winter Sundays are always good soup days. For this Italian-inspired soup, I roasted a bunch of vegetables (mostly root vegetables) with fresh rosemary, chopped fennel seeds, and red pepper flakes. You can use whatever vegetables you want or can find, just be sure to have some starchier veggies in there like potatoes/turnips/parsnips. Using a food mill instead of a blender means that you don't have to peel the vegetables or fish out the rosemary, and it gives the soup a more rustic texture. I drizzled the top with reduced balsamic vinegar and some good extra virgin olive oil.

Ingredients:

1 red potato

2 small turnips (I did peel these because they put wax on them)

2 leeks, rinsed

3 garlic cloves

1 small floret broccoli, halved

2 parsnips, roughly chopped

3 carrots, roughly chopped

1/2 big yellow onion, peeled and halved

2-3 sprigs fresh rosemary

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1/4 tsp ground pepper

3 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp balsamic vinegar

1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

1/4 tsp oregano

1/4 tsp thyme

1/2 tsp roughly chopped fennel seeds

4 cups chicken broth

Directions:

Roasted Root Vegetable Soup with White Beans

This is a great soup for a cold winter day. Roasting the veggies first makes them a little sweeter and adds more depth to the flavor. Feel free to change around the veggies if you have anything else that might work - a rutabega, more or less of various veggies - it's pureed, so you can really experiment. I added the white beans to make it a little creamier, but you can omit if you want.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

2 leeks, rinsed and halved, dark leaves cut off

3 cloves garlic

1 turnip, peeled and cut into pieces

1/2 a small butternut squash, peeled and cut into pieces