GROWING GIANT LEEKS

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29401, 31 December 1960, Page 2

GROWING GIANT LEEKS

English Miners’ Contests Though the leek has primary associations with Wales, it is in the mining areas of two of England’s northern counties, Northumberland and Durham, that competition to grow the best and biggest leeks reaches fever pitch. The northern pitmen exhibit their giant leeks at annual shows which offer prizes well worth winning; at one Tyneside show in the recent season prizes were worth £2OO. In a report broadcast in a 8.8. C. programme fpr North America, Yvonne Adamson gave a glimpse of the excitement of the time of the leek shows, when in any pit village miners can be seen making their way to the local club, pub, village or town hall where the show is to be held, carrying their leeks. And what leeks! “No puny little lily-like affairs these,” said Miss Adamson, “but great stocky plants, sometimes 14 or 15 inches in circumference — the triumph of months of work, the traditional pot of leeks of the North. Fat, succulent, shining white and polished. Even their roots are carefully combed out, groomed like ladies going to a, ball.” Secrets Pitmen tend to be secretive about how they grow their leeks to this impressive size. Some say that they feed the roots with beer, tea of rabbit manure poured down a piece of piping inserted in the trench where the leeks are grown; but the nourishing mixture each grower favours is generally wrapped in mystery. The seed they use is a top secret also; and the exhibitor of a topclass leek takes care to whisk it away as soon as the show is over, lest some sly customer should get hold of it and replant from it.

This traditional hobby probably goes back for more than 100 years, Yvonne' Adamson said, to the days when miners found leeks a valuable food to grow in times of depression when they were laid off from work. The spirit of competition grew into the keen and widespread shows of. today. In the critical period just before the shows, miners are up early and late, tending their leeks. For instance, too much rain at this time can split them, and so leek trenches are protected with a framework covered with old mackintoshes or other protective covering to drain off the water; some growers use umbrellas. The patience of these leek enthusiasts was illustrated at one of last season’s shows, when a grower of more than 70 who had been competing for 31 years, won his first major prize. His name, appropriately enough, was Hope. Apart from providing the thrill of contest, the leeks, of course, fulfill their original function of providing food for the family; and very delicious they are, particularly when cooked in the traditional North of England way rolled ifi a suet crust, wrapped in a cloth and boiled.