Grilled vegetables with seafood

Serves 4-6

Grilling vegetables can bring out great unexpected flavours that you wouldn't normally get from, say, boiling or roasting. A lot of vegetables can be grilled from raw; the firmer vegetables will need a little boiling first or they will dry up before being cooked. Cook your carrots and fennel before you set off on your barbecue.

1 large bulb of fennel
3 medium-sized carrots
2-3 courgettes, cut lengthways into cm slices
2 red peppers, quartered and seeded
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Vegetable or corn oil for brushing
500g mussels, cleaned and de-bearded
500g large cockles, washed and scrubbed
2 squid weighing about 150g, cleaned
6 large scallops, shucked and cleaned
6 large prawns, in the shell
5-6tbsp olive oil
A handful of green herbs such as fennel, chervil and flat-leaf parsley, washed

Cook the fennel in boiling salted water for about 10 minutes and the carrots a little less, depending on their size. Halve the fennel and cut into -1cm slices and the same for the carrots.

Preheat your barbecue and grill all of the vegetables for about 2-4 minutes on each side or until cooked. You will need to move the vegetables around the barbecue if they are beginning to burn – and depending on the heat of the barbecue. Once cooked, transfer to a serving dish, spoon over some of the oil and season.

You can either cook the mussels and cockles directly on the barbecue until they open, or take a pan with you and cook them in the pan with a lid on the barbecue until they open; then add to the vegetables. Cook the prawns for about 3-4 minutes on each side and add to the vegetables. Halve the squid tubes down the middle, then season with the scallops and tentacles, and cook for about 2 minutes on each side. Mix all of the fish together with the remaining oil and scatter over the herbs.