St. George's Day recipe: cockles with cider and cream

Cockles are possibly our most modest and unassuming shellfish. For me, however, the humble cockle is among the sweetest and most delicious morsels to be found on Britain's seashore. Cunningly hidden inches below the sand and mud, the cockle can typically be found in such beauty spots as Morecambe Bay in Lancashire and the Gower peninsula of South Wales, where they have been an essential source of food for millennia.

Serves 4

January to April

100g / 3½oz / ½ cup butter
1 leek, finely chopped
3 banana shallots, peeled and finely chopped
1 clove of garlic, peeled and finely chopped
100ml / 3½fl oz / scant ½ cup dry cider
150ml / 5fl oz / scant 2⁄3 cup double (heavy) cream
1kg / 2¼lb fresh cockles (baby clams), washed and prepared (see below)
500g / 1lb 2oz mussels, washed and prepared (see below)
a handful of flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped
juice of 1 lemon
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat up a heavy saucepan or casserole over a medium heat and add the butter. When it foams, add the leek, shallots and garlic and cook for 5 minutes, until softened but not browned. Add the cider and cook for a further 3 minutes, then pour in the cream. Tip in the cockles and mussels, throw in the parsley, add the lemon juice, salt and pepper, turn the heat up to high and cook with the lid on for 3 minutes.

Discard any shellfish that haven't opened. Serve with chunks of white bread and mugs of cider.

How to prepare mussels, clams, cockles, winkles and limpets

Put the shellfish in a washing up bowl of cold water. Scrub them using a small stiff brush to remove any barnacles, sand or grit. Pull any beard off the mussels. Discard any shellfish that are open and do not close when tapped against the side of the sink. Once cooked, discard any shellfish that have failed to open.

• This is an edited extract from the Countrywise Country Cookbook by Mike Robinson (Pavilion, £20). Order a copy for £16 from the Guardian bookshop