I imagined someone asking, What's the big difference between then and now? I knew that it wasn't all the changes, big and small, in Turkey or India or Singapore or Vietnam. It wasn't the computers or the internet or high-speed trains, not fast food or cheap wristwatches or everyone wearing blue jeans. The greatest difference was in me. I had survived the long road that led to the present. I felt lucky, I felt grateful. I didn't want any more than this in travel, clattering through the tunnel; I didn't want another life. I had a book to read, a book to write, and enough solitude. Most of all, someone missed me and was waiting for me, someone I loved. As Murakami had said of his own love affair with Yoko, that was everything.

Paul Theroux, Ghost Train to the Eastern Star

Killer Recipe: Spring Vegetable Soup

The other morning Mark woke up and told me he would like vegetable soup for dinner - I wasn't too enthused but on the same day I fell across a recipe and the results were brilliant!

Sure it needs a trip to the green grocer and a food processor but the results taste just like Rosella Spring Vegetable Soup that I so loved in childhood (a compliment!)

SPRING VEGETABLE SOUP

25g butter
1/2 cup sliced leeks (white part only)
1/3 cup diced celery
1/3 cup diced sweet potato
1/3 cup diced turnip
4 cups vegetable stock
salt, pepper
1/3 cup frozen corn kernels
1/3 cup diced zucchini
1/3 cup chopped green beans
1 peeled and chopped tomato
1/3 cup frozen peas
1/3 cup parsley, chopped

Melt butter, add leetk, celery, potato and turnip, cook stirring for 5 min.
Add vegetable stock, salt and pepper, bring to boil.
Lower heat and add remaining ingredients, simmer for 5 min.
Top with chopped parsley, serve with bread.

From: Bill Granger: bills SYDNEY FOOD, Murdoch Books 2004.