Samphire is a gorgeous sea vegetable – tender and succulent. It’s great just pan-fried and served as a side to fish dishes or stirred through potato salads and pastas as in the recipe below. There are two types - rock and marsh -  but you will probably be more familiar with the marsh samphire that you can now buy in supermarkets, often in the fish section or at the counter. Of course if you are near the coast it’s worth heading out and trying to forage some too!

SAMPHIRE AND CRAB LINGUINE

I particularly like using samphire in pasta dishes as it adds a wonderful crunch.

This dish is super quick and so tasty. It’s great for a weeknight if you have friends coming round and don’t have much time to cook as this recipe literally takes 10 minutes.

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 140g dried linguine or spaghetti

• 1 lemon – zested and juiced

• Quarter of a red chilli – finely chopped - or more if the chilli isn’t very spicy

• 90g marsh samphire

• 1 pot of crab meat – I like a mix of brown and white meat

• 40g hard cheese such as pecorino or parmesan, or a British alternative such as Sussex Charmer or Berkswell – grated

• Generous glug of extra virgin olive oil

• Freshly ground black pepper

 Method

• Bring a pan of water to the boil. I don’t salt the water on this occasion as the samphire, crab, and cheese are all salty. When the water is boiling, add your pasta and cook until al dente.

• Meanwhile in a separate pan gently heat your olive oil with the lemon zest, lemon juice, chopped chilli, and samphire.

• When the pasta is ready, transfer it to the other pan and toss together with the, crab, and a ladle of the pasta water, before stirring in the cheese.

• Season generously with black pepper.

• Eat immediately.