Dolce dei Santi

Like most faithful Americans, I'm a bit of a Halloween zealot. Not so much because of the overcompensatory skanky female outfits, but rather for the prospect of finally receiving that mythical razor blade in my carmel apple. Though the holiday is not celebrated with an equivalent enthusiasm in Italy, what it lacks is costume it makes up for in:

DOLCE!

I am mad about dolce. Like, -eat it alone in my closet- mad. So when I saw this Pane dei Santi and said to myself "I'm just going to buy this as a matter of blog fodder", my conscience knew I was lying. 

In Italy, November 1 is All Saints Day or Ognissanti and November 2 is Day of the Dead or Giorno dei Morti. I guess the belief is that the dead return to the living the night between November 1st and 2nd and remain with the living until the Epiphany in January. The dolce is an offering made to the recently resurfaced and is known as Pane dei Santi or Pane dei Morti; it's a tradition that apparently originated in Milan but has since become a devoutly practiced ritual of Tuscany. Anyway, I did not bake this myself, nor do I particularly care to investigate how it is prepared, but I can tell you it has a distinctly dense, cakey texture, boasts flavors of chocolate, nuts, citrus and spice, and that there isn't any left.