Do I just boil the veg in few cups of water and add all the spices at the end or at the same time as boiling?
Throw everything in with some water and cook until the veg are soft. This is not a "recipe" it is "cooking", the absolute easiest of easy.
You can saute onions, you can use fresh garlic, you can boil bones...but you don't *have to*.
I made a sort of cream of tomato soup just by using a can of plum toms or a carton of pasata (it's like 35p, nothing added) some seasoning/flavours (dried garlic etc) and then a dollop of cream cheese. It is not posh in the slightest. But DS never liked soup until fairly recently and that was canned tom soup which has salt and sugar etc, I don't mind it once in a blue moon but would prefer he didn't have that. When he asked for tom soup I made this with what I had in and he was just as happy, and it only took about 5 mins, same length of time to heat a can of soup really.
Fresh veg will take a bit longer, you might need to boil for 10-20 mins depending how big you chop the veg (or you can leave it simmering on low for an hour if you are busy doing something else and a longer cook time fits with your time better). And after pureeing all/half/some you might want to add more water/milk to thin it.
If you don't have a whizzer you can just use a fork or potato masher to mash some of the veg down which is what turns the water thick and soup like. Even vigorous stirring will do it if the veg are long cooked.
And as deb mentioned beans - you can add a can of pre-cooked beans to veg soup (I can canned in water beans/lentils), yummy, or even a can of baked beans (of course you are back to there being some processed stuff in there if it's canned baked beans).
