Very few foods have a huge comforting power: home made Carnival fritters sprinkled with powder sugar are one of those, at least to all Italians 😍
In fact, Carnival like any other holiday is connected to a culinary specialty and wherever you'll go, in Italy as well as, in many other Latin countries, you'll find these fritters.
In Turin and Piedmont people call them bugie or lies because Carnival is a time for fun, jokes and "lies", however in other regions along the boot, they take different names, so do your research or the locals will misunderstand you.
Bugie can take many forms, the most common are:
- simple thin flour and sugar fritters
- tiny donut holes filled with chocolate cream, egg custard or jam
- sweet ravioli like filled with egg custard, apricot jam or chocolate cream, sometimes nutella
The recipe is very easy though and everybody can make them at home; even though your house will smell and you'll have for an army, you'll be ecstatic and have enough to share with family and friends.
Recipe
This is our friend Manu's recipe, the most comforting one we know.
You need some grocery store paper bags to absorb the extra oil, kitchen paper towels and 2 large bowls
400 grams - 3 1/5 cups flour
60 grams - 1/2 cup sugar (granulated sugar is ok)
50 grams - 1/2 stick butter cut in pieces
2 eggs
1 glass of white wine
powder sugar to sprinkle before serving
1 pinch of salt
peanut oil to fry (is the best)
Mix the flour, the salt and the sugar together. Make a well and add the eggs and the butter pieces. Knead and slowly add the wine.
As the dough is firm and smooth, roll it down very thinly. The thinner the better!
With a knife cut it into large rectangles or diamonds.
Heat up the peanut oil in a deep pan or wok, fry a few pieces at the time: they are ready when golden.
Let the drain the excess oil on kitchen paper towels set on top of the grocery store paper bags.
When cool, put them in a bowl or serving dish and sprinkle with powder sugar right before serving.
You can use this recipe also for the stuffed ravioli-like bugie; they are very similar to donuts.
Wine pairings
You can pair them with any bubbly dessert wine, as long as the wine is sweet it'll be a good match.
We highly recommend the following Piedmont wines:
Malvasia di Castelnuovo Don Bosco by Cascina Gilli because the amount of Malvasia grapes is higher than other Malvasia wines.
if you prefer dry wines, try:
And if the weather is still quite chilly: have some mulled wine or vin brule' 🙌
Have fun making bugie, sipping wine and celebrating Carnival and remember to visit Ivrea and its orange battle to full live the Italian Mardi Gras experience.
e-mail turinepi@gmail.com if you want to share our vida royal and travel with us!
nice
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