By the end of July the fig tree in my London garden was heavy with purple-green fruit, each one ready to burst and filling my cupped palm with its voluptuous weight, like a pouch of melted rubies from a forgotten fairy story.
I had been away for a month, leaving the garden to intense heat and no rain. My ‘Westfalen’ were distressed and crisp, their gorgeous carmine flowerheads tiny and wizened. But the fig tree was magnificent, sprawling contentedly and in perfect health in the sunniest corner – and its produce was dazzling.
