With spring, the kitchen changes its rhythm. Heavy winter dishes step back, lighter vegetables take their place, and fish and seafood become a real choice again. The Spanish approach this season offers three recipes that combine all of that - squid with beans, hake with artichoke, and linguine with clams. All three without major complication, but with Mediterranean substance.

Squid in a row with white beans, roasted cherry tomatoes and rosemary. Time: 55 minutes, serves four. Needed: 600g squid in rings, 400g white beans, 300g cherry tomatoes, a large onion, two cloves of garlic, a red pepper, 120ml white wine, a spoon of tomato paste, 400g passata, olive oil, salt, pepper, smoked paprika, bay leaf, rosemary, parsley. The cherry tomatoes go in the oven at 200°C for 20 minutes with a little rosemary. Onion, garlic and pepper are sauteed for 12 minutes. Tomato paste is added, then the squid for two minutes. Pour in the wine, add the passata, bay and rosemary - simmer for 20 minutes. Beans and roasted tomatoes at the end, another five minutes. Parsley on top.

Hake in green sauce with artichoke and peas. Time: 40 minutes, serves four. Four hake fillets, leek, eight artichokes, 120g peas, two cloves of garlic, a spoon of flour, 150ml white wine, 250ml fish stock, parsley, olive oil, salt, pepper, boiled eggs to garnish. Artichokes are cleaned and dipped in lemon water. First they're treated in salted water. Leek is sauteed for six minutes, garlic is added, then the flour, then the wine. Once thickened, add fish stock, artichokes and peas. Parsley at the end. Hake goes into the sauce - two and a half minutes per side. Move the pan back and forth to emulsify the sauce.

Linguine with clams, courgette, and white wine sauce. Time: 30 minutes, serves four. 400g linguine, 800g clams, a large courgette, two leeks, two cloves of garlic, 120ml white wine, three spoons of cream, olive oil, lemon, chilli, parsley, salt, pepper, a knob of butter. Clams are steamed for three to four minutes with 60ml of wine in a covered pan. Half the meat is removed from the shells. Courgette is cut into thin ribbons with a peeler. Leek is sauteed for five minutes, garlic and chilli added, then wine and the clam liquid. Cream and lemon zest go in. Pasta is cooked al dente. Courgette into the sauce, then pasta, clams, and lemon juice. Butter at the end for shine.

One rule applies to all three recipes: a clam that doesn't open when cooked - gets thrown out. It's not stubborn, it's most likely off. The same rule applies to other miracles in the kitchen - if something doesn't want to work properly from the start, it's usually better not to insist.

These recipes aren't new or revolutionary. They're classic Mediterranean. But that is exactly why they work - they have five centuries behind them. In the Balkans we've always pretended our cuisine is Mediterranean too. Partly it is. This season is a good moment to remember - the artichoke isn't only Sicilian, hake isn't only Spanish, and clams can be cooked without paying 90 euros a plate at a restaurant with Venetian aspirations on the menu.