If you tire of eating asparagus simply cooked and garnished — hard to imagine but it can happen — try them gratinéed: wrapped in sliced ham and coated with a creamy cheese sauce, then grilled until bubbling hot. Serve as a main course with a green salad.

Ingredients
Feeds 2. Takes 30 mins.

20 medium asparagus spears
10 thin slices ham
100ml cream
1tsp Dijon mustard
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Ground nutmeg
2tbsp grated parmesan

Heat the oven to 200C/Gas mark 6. Wash and dry the asparagus and snap off and discard the fibrous ends. Cut each ham slice in half, and wrap around each spear, leaving the tips uncovered.

Arrange the asparagus neatly in a buttered gratin dish. In a bowl or jug, mix the cream, mustard, salt, pepper and nutmeg, stirring well, then pour over the asparagus. Scatter with the grated parmesan and bake for around 20 minutes until golden brown and bubbling, and until the tip of a knife inserted in the thickest part of a spear meets with no resistance. Place under the grill if it doesn’t brown easily.

Times Recommends

• Jane MacQuitty’s party wine
• Oliver Peyton's Christmas pavlova
• Blood orange cosmopolitan