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In my mind it's so ordinary to improvise soup (whether or not "excellently") that the doing of it scarcely merits mention.
Winter squash? Cook with onions, garlic, and apple in stock or water. Throw in a potato if you have one. Season with salt and pepper and thyme. Puree. For greater elegance, run the puree through your food mill. Add cream, or milk and butter, or just plain milk.
Vegetable soup? Look in the vegetable crispers for what's on hand. (Omit crucifers unless you want their strong taste.) If you plan to puree this soup, cut veggies into same-sized chunks. For a textured, unpureed soup, cut them carefully into matching dice. Carrots, onions, celery, sweet potato, rutabaga, parsnips, winter greens. Tomatoes (canned or dried). Herb the soup the way you like.
I've never met a soup that wasn't improved by homemade croutons: cube leftover bread and toss with olive oil.
Fry up or bake (if the oven is already on). Sprinkle on soup as you eat it, a few at a time, so they don't get soggy.
The best way to eat soup? Puree it and serve it in a mug, for sipping. Goodness knows my mother taught me the proper way to approach a soup bowl (move the soup spoon away from you as you scoop the soup, sip the soup from the side of the spoon). I can don the mantle of civilization if forced to, sitting at a table and eating my soup with a spoon. But I'd rather lounge on a sofa, feet up, with a mug of hot, pureed soup in one hand and a book in the other, to indulge in my two favourite pastimes at the same time: eating and reading. Which is actually just one favourite pastime: eating-and-reading.
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