Bill Wade, Post-Gazette photos Walt Danna, known as the "Ramp Man," with the plants in the backyard of his home in Hopewell, Washington County. Click photo for larger image. Related articles Ramp love is rampant at festivals Cock-A-Rampy Soup More ramp recipes

Ramps are wild leeks that taste sort of like a cross between onion and garlic, make people's breath and bodies stink, and cause eccentric behavior.

Folks dig ramps so much, they hike out into the still-snowy woods to, well, dig them up.

Some make chocolate chip cookies with ramps, and eat them.

They'll be relishing ramp relish, ramp burgers, ramp cornbread and beans, beer-battered ramps, grilled ramps, ramp shishkabobs, raw ramps, even ramp wine and ramp cheese this Saturday and Sunday at the 17th annual Ramp Festival, held by the Mason-Dixon Historical Society at its private park in Mt. Morris, Greene County. This is just off Interstate 79, between Waynesburg and Morgantown, about 65 miles south of Pittsburgh (details at www.rockforgearts.com/ mdpark.html).

You may be able to follow your nose to the event, which runs from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and includes crafters and live music.

But the real star of the show is the ramp, which is just coming into season, and is celebrated a many such festivals. These include the granddaddy "Feast of the Ramson," also Saturday, in Richwood, W.Va., which bills itself "The Ramp Capital of the World."

Ramp Dip and Ramp Toast by Walt Danna. Click photo for larger image.

These wild things range from the Carolinas to Canada. West Virginia's love affair with them is well documented. But they're also dear to Pennsylvanians in remote places such as Potter County, where they call 'em wild leeks and where church and firehall "ham and leek suppers" soon sprout along with the wide lily-like leaves of the plant.

Digging this spring tonic "is a generational tradition in many local families," notes Donald Gilliland, managing editor of the Potter Leader-Enterprise in Coudersport. Last spring he wrote a delightful ode to Allium tricoccum. Natives referred to it by the same word they used for skunk, "chicagoua," for which the Illinois city is named.

Think they can't be so strong? Years ago, before school, he wrote, "Boys would gorge themselves on leeks, get themselves sent home, and then happily go turkey hunting."

But to many, that taste is a gourmet, if gamey, treat. An unabashed "leek-and-Limburger" lover, Mr. Gilliland grew up eating them on sandwiches with butter and salt. But at Germania Fire Co.'s annual leek dinner, he's also "been treated to the exquisite combination of raw leek eaten out of hand alternately with freshly shucked raw oysters."

	Bean Soup and Deviled Eggs with Ramps Click photo for larger image.

He describes the singular taste and "odoriferous wallop" as "hotter than garlic, but not as sharp" and "redolent of the deep woods, with a musky, grasslike tang that brings to mind a big handful of rich, black forest dirt."

Never heard of ramps? Neither had Lewis J. Matt III, who moved from his native Pennsylvania Dutch Country to Greene County to work at a state prison.

In 2001, he went to the local Ramp Festival, tried a ramp burger and loved it. "I was introduced to a whole new taste." Before he knew it, he was munching ramps whole. "Of course it makes your breath smell terrible."

This from someone who, since he retired from corrections, works as a state sewage enforcement officer.

He's also an organic farmer, cook and food editor for "The Greene Saver" newspaper who has collected ramp recipes into a cookbook.

Bill Wade, Post-Gazette Walt Danna holds ramps dug from a patch in his Washington County yard. Click photo for larger image.

As he notes, cooking makes ramps' flavor more subtle. "You can add just a few ramps to something like potato soup, and ... all of a sudden it takes on a whole new excitement."

That's why city chefs can't wait to get their hands on ramps. Especially those who treasure local ingredients such as Bonna Terra's Douglass Dick. Lots of city folk aren't familiar with the ramp, but, "Once somebody tries it, they go nuts." He loves the "intense onion-chive flavor, not bitter at all," that the leaves sweetly impart to ramp butter, with which he bastes slow-roasted beef. "Ramps are what kick off the spring for me."

Any trendiness tickles longtime fans. You'll find a recipe for pickled ramps in the March issue of Martha Stewart Living.

From now until early May, you may be able find them at upscale markets and roadside stands. But, living in this region, you may be able to find them in your own backyard, in the wooded ravines and creek bottoms that criss-cross even urban neighborhoods. Don't try to pull; you'll need to dig them up.

Just treat them carefully, and we mean that beyond the "Dig one, leave one" conservation advice that Walt Danna gives.

Mr. Danna, aka the Ramp Man, is as colorful a character as you'll meet at the Mason-Dixon Historical Society Ramp Festival.

There, he'll be serving his trademark ramp victuals, including his ramp kielbasa, ramp toast (like garlic toast), ramp deviled eggs, even ramp cookies, all of which you can get on his infamous sampler platter.

"Eat 'til you sweat," is one of his many ramp aphorisms. But that powerful -- he'll tell you, medicinal -- effect is the reason to revel in stink. "You either love to hate them," he says, "or you hate to love them."