Ramping up the pulled pork.

I forgot my helpers.

As a collective response:

Yes, they are memorably good and we look foward to "leek-time". The bugs this time of year, cut down on the pleasure of digging. You have to hit the woodlot early.

They are a popular Appalachian Mountain chain plant but can be found, I understand, around at least in Michigan. Maybe elsewhere too?  We find them with Golden Seal, Ginseng (locally called "Chin-Chang") and the delicious Fiddle-Heads in the rich soiled, damp under growth of our stony hills.

The blackness of the fried leaves is a turn-off for some but fried less then that way, they are too chewy. Meatloaf, laced with leak leaves is deadly. Wherever you find yourself after dinner, you will be standing alone.  As popular as they are in these hills, none of our friends have ever fried the leaves. They just eat the bulbs and disgard the leaves. These are families who have lived in our hollows for 200 years; a dozen or more generations.  Hard to understand the logic. It's probably a regional thing. We weren't raised here.

I believe that you can buy them on the internet and have them shipped to California but the postal service will become suspicious, as the aroma has a way if sifting through. The pot-sniffing dogs would be laid-up for days; maybe a week?