One of my favourite recipes, these fresh, juicy cockles are just steamed open and topped with a fragrant herb sauce. Serve with lots of crusty bread for mopping up the juices.
Serves: 6
INGREDIENTS
Green sauce
½ packed cup each parsley leaves and mint leaves
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon smoked paprika
⅓ cup olive oil
Cockles
1 tablespoon olive oil
1.5 kilograms cockles, cleaned (see Cook’s note)
2 cloves garlic, crushed
½ teaspoon dried chilli flakes
To serve
2 tablespoons roughly chopped parsley
lemon wedges
METHOD
Green sauce: Place all the ingredients in a small food processor and blend until smooth. Set aside.
Cockles: Heat the oil in a large sauté pan over a high heat. Add the cockles, garlic and chilli then cover and steam until the cockles have opened. Discard any that remain closed.
To serve: Using a slotted spoon, transfer the cockles to a serving dish. Put ½ cup of the cooking liquid into a bowl and stir in the green sauce.
Spoon this over the cockles, scatter over the parsley and serve immediately with lemon wedges for squeezing.
Cook’s note: To clean the cockles, place in a large bowl of cold water with 2 teaspoons of salt. Leave for 15 minutes for them to purge any sand, then drain well.
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In Dream Escape, we journey from Japan and Morocco to Italy, India and beyond, sharing recipes inspired by travel, heritage and comfort. We celebrate the champions of the Outstanding Food Producer Awards, explore the stories and recipes of chefs shaped by their cultural roots, and warm up with everything from West African soups and slow-braised lamb to porchetta, butter chicken and beef noodle soup. Alongside destination menus, Scandinavian sweets and cosy pub classics, Chrisanne Terblanche shares her favourite street-side dining spots in Bangkok, while Yvonne Lorkin explores red wine varietals. This issue, we invite you to slow down, turn the pages and escape through food.