by William Grimes

Gina DePalma, a pastry chef whose artfully simple Italian desserts helped make Babbo in Greenwich Village one of Manhattan's most beloved and admired restaurants, died on Tuesday at a hospice in the Bronx. She was 49. The cause was ovarian cancer, her sister, Maria DePalma, said.

Ms. DePalma credited her mother and grandmother, Italian immigrants from Calabria, for teaching her not only how to cook but also how to think about food. "Use what is local, use what is available, and use ingredients to their fullest potential," she wrote in the preface to "Dolce Italiano: Desserts From the Babbo Kitchen," published in 2007. Her sweet ideal was panna cotta, a study in minimalism.

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Source: http://www.nytimes.com/