Pronzo with the Santoro family

One of the most fun things to do here in Bari is get invited to someone's house for lunch(pronzo).  This is when they do their big meal of the day.  The Santoro family invited us for pronzo on Dec 8th which is the "Feast of the Immaculate Conception" holiday.  This celebrates the conception of Mary in her mother's womb--not the conception of Jesus.  On the night before this holiday, Catholics attend evening mass. Anyway, it was nice for them to have a holiday and wonderful for us to share it with them.

Here is Chris already to eat!  Anna asked if he would like something to cover his white shirt as there is always pasta as the first dish.  He  said--"no, no I won't get anything on it."  I said "Yes. Please..he needs a bib--the funnest one you have!"   So he got this one--It says: dopo controlla il tuo peso  which means check your weight after...            

For the first course we had some delicious fettuccini in marinara sauce with squid ink then....

This was the secondo--stuffed squid.

Here's the close-up--head and all.  It actually tasted OK.  Before we ate, Fratello Santoro showed me the plate of squid and I asked him if he was trying to scare me.  I didn't know what it was...

Third course is always fruit and I tried lychee for the first time.  Finally they had a delicious torta for dessert.  YUM!

Here's the amazing Santoro family minus their son Luca who is on a mission in Milan and will return in March.  Their daughter is Mariateresa and is a very special girl.  She has also served a mission in Milan and has been back for a couple years.   She speaks great English and has been so kind to me. Love her a lot!