Springtime in West Virginia: Ramps Festival!

When I had a West Virginia-themed housewarming party three years ago, one friend brought me two gifts. One I recognized: a little vase of lillies of the valley. The other I didn't recognize: it looked like a cross between oversized green onions and leeks. That was my first encounter with a West Virginia native food: ramps. Here's what my friend said: "When you eat these (handing me the ramps), you'll want these to balance out the smell (handing me the lillies of the valley)." She also cautioned me to have windows open when I cooked the ramps.

So then I dug out my Joy of Cooking reference book to find out more about ramps. Here's what it said: "These and the strong field garlic . . . in your lawn are not recommended by us although we frequently see them praised by others."

Apparently, people either love or hate ramps. People who hate them talk of ramps seeping through your pores and stinking up rooms for days at a time. People who love them talk about how ramps are part of their childhood memories of West Virginia. My take is that the people who say they hate ramps are really saying they hate anything that could be linked to a hillbilly image.

Today was the annual ramps festival in Mt. Morris, PA. Some friends and I piled in the car to check it out. I'd eaten ramps before, and I kinda liked them, and I'm all about a small town festival. We wandered around the various booths, looking for some kind of sampler plate, when we saw this sign:



Bingo! I mean, who wouldn't want to eat food cooked by Walter the Ramp Chef? (I'm pretty sure the sign meant to say "horseradish" rather than "horserash." I don't want to know what "horserash" might be.) So we stepped up for our ramps platters, after a brief photo op:

You can tell which one is Walter, right? So what do ramps look like? You can kind of tell from this picture, although the ramps are in some kind of bacon/sausage shish kabob dealie (which I think ended up in the beans on the sampler plate):

Here's what the actual sampler plate looked like. From left to right, top to bottom: baked beans with ramps and some kind of sausage, a ramps roll with ramps butter, a ramps chocolate chip cookie (I know, sounds gross-- but it really didn't taste bad), a deviled egg, a pickled egg (pickled in ramps vinegar), some kind of French toast dish with ramps gravy, and a ramps potato pancake.

The verdict? Most of the food was pretty good. I didn't try the ramps mints (honestly, isn't that an oxymoron?), but my friend did. I didn't buy any ramps for home cooking, nor did I buy a ramps cookbook, but it was kind of fun to be part of the festivities. We went home pretty early because my friends' kids were cold and tired.

And as soon as we got in the car, one of my friends passed out gum. So, um, maybe you don't want to sit next to me tomorrow morning in church.