The fig is one of the few foods that needs no marketing. When it shows up at the market, summer is ending - this year the season started as early as August because of the high temperatures. It has a short window, spoils fast and does not tolerate waiting. Which is exactly why it is strange how few things we do with it.

Nutritionally, a fig is not just sugar. It has fibre that helps digestion and gives a feeling of fullness, minerals - potassium, calcium and magnesium - that work for muscles and bones, natural sugars for quick energy, vitamins and phenolic compounds that protect cells, and a high water content. The skin is edible when the fruit is ripe, and that is where part of the fibre and the useful compounds sit.

For breakfast it works almost everywhere: in yoghurt with walnuts and seeds, over porridge, as a topping on chia pudding. Among starters the pairing with cheese is the one that never fails - toast with cheese and rocket, figs on a board with cheeses, skewers with mozzarella and cherry tomatoes, or simply next to hummus.

In a salad the fig plays the same role as a pickle in a heavy dish - it is the counterpoint. With prosciutto and green leaves, with goat's cheese, in a caprese version with mozzarella, or with avocado and seeds. That sweet hit in the middle of a savoury base is what stops a salad being an obligation.

For dessert it is used as decoration on tarts and cakes, as an ingredient in the batter, or dipped in chocolate. And here comes the least expected part: the fig also goes on pizza, into chutney or sauce, alongside ice cream, as a garnish on soup and into pasta.

All of which means one thing. If you only eat figs as fruit straight off a plate, you are using them in one way out of fifteen possible ones - and in a season that lasts a few weeks. Next year the same dilemma will show up in the same place, except by then you will already know what to do.