We Native West Virginians miss many things about the Mountain State when circumstances force us to leave home, and two of the things we miss most are food items. Our mouths water just from thinking about them, and we can’t wait to visit for a taste of home.

First, we crave Mister Bee potato chips. The good news is that we West Virginians in exile can haul stashes of chips with us after visiting home or grab a few bags if we are fortunate enough to drive through the state in our travels.

But the best Mountain State delicacy of all time is the pepperoni roll. I can’t wait to visit my parents — or for them to visit us — because Mom almost always makes a batch when we’re together. They taste best fresh out of the oven, with a sheen of melted butter on top. They’re great for breakfast, lunch, dinner or snack — or all of the above. Just pop ‘em in the microwave for 10-15 seconds.

Many pizza places in the state sell homemade pepperoni rolls and distribute them through grocery stores and convenience marts. My wife is hooked on the meaty, cheesy and saucy mix I introduced her to at Pasco’s in New Martinsville, W.Va. She has to make a trip there at least once every time we visit my family.

I love taking pepperoni rolls to work in the Washington, D.C., area. We’re not far from West Virginia, yet most people here have never heard of pepperoni rolls. They love ‘em once they get a taste. A colleague once told me he’d pay $1.50 per roll to buy them from street vendors in the city. That was in the early ’90s!

So how did the pepperoni roll come to be such a food staple in West Virginia? Not even this enlightened redneck knew the answer to that until my Mom told me last night she had read a story about that recently. That newsflash sent me scrambling to Google, and I found this nugget in, of all places, a New York Times story published Sept. 30:

In 1900, West Virginia was home to more native-born citizens than any other state. But, as the coal industry boomed and labor needs surged, that changed. Coal companies sought, as one historian put it, “a more docile, controllable work force than their American-born counterparts.”

They did not get what they bargained for. Italian immigrants were just as inclined, if not more so, toward union affiliation and action. By 1915, there were more Italian laborers than any of the other 20-plus nationalities working the coal fields.

Out of that cauldron of labor strife and self-definition came a hybridized food that owed as much to West Virginia as it did to Calabria, the region from which so many of the Italian immigrants came. …

Most informed eaters here know the early script: In advance of clambering into a dank and dark coal seam, Italian miners loaded tin pails with hunks of hearth-baked bread as well as various American takes on Italian salumi, from bologna to pepperoni.

From there, it was a short evolutionary step to selling commercially baked pepperoni rolls in taverns and country stores to shift workers in need of cheap and portable food.

I guess that means I’ve been an uninformed fan of pepperoni rolls for about four decades now. I feel so much more enlightened now.

I want to enlighten the rest of America, too. Stay tuned for a future video report about pepperoni rolls. I’ve been wanting to produce one for months. Now I’m even more inspired.

P.S. Did you know there is a Wikipedia entry on pepperoni rolls? I didn’t. I wasn’t surprised, however, to learn that the story in the Times triggered a debate about who makes the best pepperoni rolls.

And the answer is … Danny Glover’s mother, with Pasco’s running a close second.