I did not have a bale of straw or enough mulch to totally bury my fig.
The last two years, I have put a wire cage around the fig, piled some big scoops of mulch a couple inches high on the bottom and then piled leaves on top filling the cage. Every now and then, if the leaves looked like they’d sunk, I’d pile more on so it was totally buried and the leaves were pretty packed. I actually think because the leaves were pretty dense it stayed reasonably dry inside.
My figs are small and the main shoots only died back at the tip, even though we had some pretty long, cold spells.
This year, with one fig, I decided to try training it to the ground. I’ve seen this called the Japanese method or “step over figs” like this: Step over figs.
I am not fancy so I just took the two largest shoots and pinned them to the ground with those big landscape staples. For that fig, it was very easy to bury.
I think @TNHunter is basically doing both of these things (cutting off the fruiting shoots while leaving big main branches & burying his fig) and I sort of copied him but ended up using what materials I had available.