5 Parma Ham canapés for the holidays

Polenta is a woefully underused ingredient in the UK, but it’s a fantastic thing to prepare when you want a flavourful base to put other ingredients on. Here, the polenta is flavoured with Parmesan before being fried until crisp, before being topped with a mixture of Parma Ham, fried garlicky cep mushrooms and a little lemon and chilli. The rustic flavours all come together to create an earthy, warming, deeply savoury bite.

Cannoli are Sicily’s most famous dessert, often filled with cream, chocolate and nuts, but here the idea is given a savoury twist. Parma Ham is blitzed into ricotta to create a silky mousse, which is piped into crisp cannoli shells and decorated with chopped capers. Incredibly moreish, delightfully crisp and seriously flavourful.

Crostini come topped with all sorts of delicious things in Italy, but this combination of Parma Ham, pine nuts, Stracciatella and rocket is one of the tastiest we’ve come across. Taking literally minutes to prepare – all you need to do is toast the bread – they’re perfect for last-minute snacking and a perfect example of how top-quality Italian ingredients can create something truly delicious without any effort.

You often see Parma Ham wrapped around meat and fish, but here it’s used to completely encase a light, fresh filling of peas, vegetables and cheese, tied together with thin strips of asparagus stalk. Best of all, they can be made well in advance and simply removed from the fridge 10 minutes before serving.