Cooking SA's spectacular seafood produce should be simple, and this recipe involves minimum fuss so you can spend maximum time relaxing.

Recipes & Styling Natalie Homan | Photographs Brendan Homan

Cockles with lemon & turmeric quinoa “al cartoccio”
serves 2

1 tbsp olive oil
½ onion, finely diced
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp turmeric
1 cup cooked quinoa (or any leftover cooked grain, e.g. rice)
1 lemon, zest and juice
sea salt & cracked black pepper
500g cockles
2 spring onion, finely sliced
lemon wedges, to serve

Preheat oven to 200C. Heat a medium frypan over medium heat. Add oil and onion and sauté until softened. Add garlic and turmeric and cook for a further minute. Take off the heat, add quinoa, zest and juice from the lemon and season with salt and pepper. Stir well to mix through.

Place two large sheets of baking paper onto the kitchen bench. Place half the quinoa mix in a mound in the centre of each sheet. Divide the cockles and place half on each sheet. Bring up the edges of the baking paper to create a parcel and secure tightly with kitchen string. Place both parcels onto an oven tray and place in the oven to cook for 15 minutes.

Place the parcels on serving plates and serve with lemon wedges and spring onion.

This recipe first appeared in the January 2022 issue of SALIFE magazine.