PROCTORVILLE — Winter is over and spring is in the air, or is that the pungent aroma of some people’s favorite onion — allium tricoccum, also known as the ramp.

By the end of the week the men from the Proctorville VFW Post 6878 will be out digging up those early spring vegetables with the garlicky odor and flavor.

Then on Saturday both the men and women of the post will be frying them up along with potatoes and white and brown beans with ham hocks to serve the post’s annual ramp dinner.

“They come from all over,” Jane Napier, a member of the Post’s Ladies Auxiliary, said. “They come from up in Columbus, everywhere.”

Looking much like a scallion or cultivated green onion, the ramp goes by a variety of names from ramson, wild leek and wild garlic. The ramp is a perennial with a white bulb-end that extends to light green leaves. They are most popular in dishes of the rural upland South and from the Canadian province of Quebec.

“They are like the onion family. Some of them have to be dug, usually on a creek bank,” Napier said. “The men will go out and pick the ramps on Friday and they will clean them. Then on Saturday we will start to cook them up.”

While some aficionados will pickle the ramps or put them in soup, the cooks at the post like to fry up the ramps with bacon and potatoes. The cooks will go through about 10 pounds of potatoes before the day is over. Also on the menu will be cole slaw, drinks and desserts.

And for those who can’t get enough ramps at the dinner, there will be some available to buy.

“A lot of people like to buy them raw and cook them,” Napier said. “I guess it is an old-time thing. A lot of people used to years ago dig ramps. They love it. People have done it for so many years. People know it’s ramp time.”

The dinner is 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. with tickets for adults at $6 and children 10 and under at $4.