Buttermilk Bars

Look, buttermilk bars! Okay they're not really buttermilk bars, they're buttermilk balls. Alright they're not buttermilk balls either, they're called Castegnole. (Food mirages are not uncommon when you've been without traditional American fare for as many years as I have.) These are one of the many -- too many! -- delicious sweets prepared exclusively during the Carnevale season in Italy. Little balls of dough traditionally fried in lard and pictured here smothered in honey. Carnevale, or IMardi Gras, is celebrated here forty days before Easter, as a final party before Ash Wednesday and the restrictions of Lent. It's too bad I'm not a practicing Catholic because after eating several of these, Lent is not a bad idea.
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