A friend's sausage soup

Now. I will share with you the warm, kinda spicy, scrumptious soup my friend ate as she typed the recipe on her family blog.
She found a recipe in a hunt for new (because she was bored with the usuals), easy (because she currently lives in an apartment with weird kitchen supplies), and relatively healthy (because a late summer baby + holidays + stuck inside for the winter = pants that seem to have shrunk) recipes. But she changed some things.
The Ingredients:

* 1/2 pound italian sausage
* 1/2 cup chopped onion
* 1/2 cup chopped carrot
* sliced mushrooms
* 1 garlic clove, minced
* 1 cup water
* 2 (19-ounce) cans great northern beans, undrained
* 1 (15.75-ounce) can fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth
* basil, pepper, italian seasoning (because that's what's in the pantry here)

Brown sausage, drain, saute veggies, add remaining ingredients. Simmer and serve with crusty bread.

Edited to add: The husband ate some soup after he got home from his job and couldn't stop raving. He said, "it's the best new soup I've tried lately."