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# Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen

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Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen [DePalma, Gina, Batali, Mario] on desertcart.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen

Review: La dolce vita... - Gina DePalma's Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen collects a treasure trove of desserts and savories from Mario Batali's Babbo restaurant ( The Babbo Cookbook ) in NYC. There are several forewords, including one by Mario Batali himself and Colum Sheehan, wine director of Babbo. Gina's thorough introduction includes her own earliest memories of her Nonni's kitchen and growing up in a Italian-American family that still revolved around the Italian style of shopping and cooking. She includes a section called Learning Italian that covers various regions, DOP and IGP origins, a recommended reading list, ten Italian ingredients you should know (some will surprise you!), and a brief, effective section on equipment. The first section is devoted to Italian cookies and includes several almond-based cookies (almond fingers, chocolate kisses, mostaccioli), semolina cookies (lemony semolina cookies), polenta cookies, chestnut brownies, and several biscottis (almond, orange and anise, mosaic, polenta and sesame). Many are light and refreshing rather than the heavy, dense, cloyingly sweet desserts that Americans prefer, and the presence of polenta gives baked goods a rather toothsome crunch that will be unfamiliar to American palates. Cakes include several gems, including grappa-soaked mini sponge cakes, citrus-glazed polenta cake, chestnut spice cake with mascarpone cream, almond and raisin cake, chocolate and walnut torte from Capri, zucchini-olive oil cake with lemon crunch glaze, yogurt cheesecake with pine nut brittle, obsessive ricotta cheesecake filled with candied orange and lemon rind, and Venetian apple cake rich with honey, spices, and polenta. The Venetian apple cake had just the right touch of sweetness from the shredded apple and honey, and the almond cake from Abruzzo was a delightful blend of toasted almonds, semolina flour, chocolate, and Amaretto. Spoon Desserts consist of bonets, custards, bavarians, panna cotta, and zabaione, many of them savory additions such as pumpkin, fresh bay leaf custards, yogurt with caramel, aged balsamic, and pine nut brittle, and a lovely cool rhubarb soup with orange and mint fior di latte that is a refreshing start to a spring or summer dinner. My favorite section was the Tarts, a personal favorite of mine. Unusual choices included a fresh cranberry tart perfect for fall, a sour cherry custard tart very similar to a French clafoutis, a blueberry and coconut tart, the divine honey and pine nut tart (you can't convince me that this isn't what angels eat!), chocolate and polenta tart (obscenely good with a scoop of gelato), and fruit tarts (fig, lemon, apple crumb, hazelnut and grape). The next section sounded good, but lacking an ice cream maker, I was unable to try out any of the ice creams or sorbets. However, if/when I do purchase one, the fig and ricotta gelato, ginger honey gelato, and espresso cinnamon gelato are tops on my list. I don't eat fried foods, so I haven't had the chance to sample any of these firsthand. Fried treats include fritters (pumpkin, herbed goat cheese, lemon ricotta, apple), Florentine doughnuts with vanilla custard, Neapolitan doughnuts with warm chocolate sauce, and cream puffs. Ways with Fruit includes traditional fruit-and-alcohol combinations such as strawberries in Chianti, Balaton cherries with grappa and mascarpone, white peach and prosecco gelatina, honey-baked figs stuffed with walnuts, sweet apple omelet, and marmelades (Meyer lemon and spiced blood orange). Celebrations includes holiday dishes such as St. Joseph's Day cream puffs (served on the feast day of St. Joseph, March 19), Easter egg bread, sweet grape focaccia (served at the annual grape harvest), chocolate "salami" (relax, vegetarians, it's made out of chocolate and nuts and rolled in powdered sugar to look like casing!), panforte (a traditional fruit-and-nut-stuffed bread from Siena) and pandoro (sweet Christmas breads). The final chapter, Savory Bites, includes breadsticks, taralli (similar to pretzels), semolina and sesame crackers, calcioni, and cheese puffs (Gina includes notes on her favorite Italian cheeses). Dolce Italiano is an absolutely gorgeous cookbook that is unparalleled in terms of culinary technique, the quality of Gina's experiences in and out of various kitchens, and the delicious end results, whether sweet or savory. The only potential downside is difficulty in locating specific Italian ingredients such as millifiori honey, decent grappa, Piedmontese hazelnuts, fresh chestnuts and chestnut flour, fresh (not commercial) ricotta and mascarpone cheeses, "OO" flour, aged balsamic (although I've had luck at Zingerman's Deli in Ann Arbor, [...]) and Sicilian pistachios, although Gina includes a "Sources" section at the back of the book (that is, if you don't mind the expense of having your cheese overnighted from NYC!!). If you're a fan of Italian / Mediterranean cuisine, you owe it to yourself to add this to your collection, presto. This is a beautiful cookbook that will bring you hours of enjoyment as you discover traditional Italian desserts that combine sometimes unlikely pairings that result in taste bud-tickling creations that taste like something your Italian grandmother would have baked.
Review: Superb Reference on Italian Dessert Recipes and Techniques - `Dolce Italiano, Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen' by Babbo pastry chef, Gina DePalma is another in a long list of cookbooks from high end restaurant pastry chefs such as Sherry Yard (Spago), Kate Zuckerman (Chanterelle), and Emily Luchetti (Stars). And, like all of these other superior books, Mme. DePalma offers far more than a simple presentation of recipes. While both Yard's `Secrets of Baking' and Zuckerman's `The Sweet Live' both serve as excellent manuals on baking in general, and Yard's latest `Desserts by the Yard' is a great culinary memoir with even greater recipes (as well as a great source of recipes for Austrian classics), DePalma takes yet another route by presenting a serious reference on shopping for, baking, and serving Italian dessert specialties. A jaded reader of Italian cookbooks has some right to be just a bit skeptical that Mario Batali's employee Ms. DePalma, a better than average restaurant chef (not yet at the heights of the Wolfgang Puck's Sherry Yard), can come up with a better than average book on her well-travelled subject. But, she does succeed and I am happy to have this book among all these other distinguished books. To be sure, Ms. DePalma does cover much familiar ground, but starts to broaden her appeal when she adds discussions of desserts and wines to her narrative, with the assistance of the very impressive credentials of the Babbo wine experts, lead by employer Joseph Bastianich. In fact, she mentions a major Italian staple, vin cotto (cooked wine), which has escaped my attention in all these readings. In a nutshell, it tends to fit many of the same roles as the far more expensive balsamic vinegar. While this book will not serve as a complete baking manual, it has many sections of truly superb instruction on how to do some basic Italian cooking procedures, as in her three page sidebar on `Pastry Crust 101'. Having read everyone from Martha Stewart to Rose Levy Beranbaum to Nick Malgieri on making basic pie crust, I amazingly find Ms. DePalma's description to be one of the pedagogically most satisfying. In plainer words, she says the same things, but the way she describes them make the subject easier to understand if you are a beginner. For a Brooklyn girl, her insights into Italian cuisine are often as interesting and as profound as her boss, the orange-clogged Batali. One observation is especially acute, when she notes that unlike many Americans, the crust to a pastry is at least as important to Italians as what you put in that crust. This is entirely consistent with their passion for the quality of breads and pasta, giving them equal attention as the more splashy sauces and toppings which go with the spaghetti or the pizza. And, like the French, there are many desserts which may be no more than two exquisitely prepared ingredients, the crust and a fruit jelly, jam, or preserve. This is yet another instance of the Italian genius for prepared and preserved intermediates, adding fruit preserves to the list of wines, cheeses, breads, vinegars, salumis, and pastas which make Italian cuisine appear so effortless and yet so great. While virtually all the recipes in the book were developed to be served at Babbo, they still represent a superb reference for so many classic Italian sweets. Some leading examples are biscotti, ricotta cheesecake, zucchini cake, panna cotta, zabaione, baked polenta, breadsticks, panforte di Siena, and strufoli. The only major Italian dessert I did not find were the iconic canolis. The book's design leans just a bit toward the budget-conscious, as all the color pics of the desserts are in a few centrally bound rotogravure signatures, rather than right next to the recipe. I also miss illustrations of the basic kitchen tools and graphic instructions on the otherwise excellent tutorials on technique. And yet, I was immediately impressed with Ms. DePalma's excellent map of Italy with all its major political regions and cities plainly and clearly laid out. It could have used just a bit more detail, such as pointing out the location of the Amalfi coast (south of Naples), the source of Italy's best lemons. Like Ms. Yard and Ms. Zuckerman, Gina has a way with her words in putting together her recipes and procedures. All procedures are effortlessly detailed and all ingredients such as type of fruit, vinegar, wine, of flour, are precise, without being arcane. She is also so kind as to recommend methods for both garnishing the dessert and storing the leftovers. In case this is not obvious, there is very little in this book about bread baking. For that, I suggest (as does Miss DePalma) that you go to Carol Field's classic `The Italian Baker'. And, a thank you to Mario for suggesting to Miss Gina that she write this very worthy book.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| ASIN  | 0393061000 |
| Best Sellers Rank | #1,124,991 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #896 in Italian Cooking, Food & Wine #2,703 in Dessert Baking (Books) |
| Customer Reviews | 4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars (108) |
| Dimensions  | 8.5 x 1.2 x 10.3 inches |
| ISBN-10  | 9780393061000 |
| ISBN-13  | 978-0393061000 |
| Item Weight  | 2.3 pounds |
| Language  | English |
| Print length  | 384 pages |
| Publication date  | October 8, 2007 |
| Publisher  | W. W. Norton & Company |

## Images

![Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61yh15LFigL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ La dolce vita...
*by K***O on April 8, 2008*

Gina DePalma's Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen collects a treasure trove of desserts and savories from Mario Batali's Babbo restaurant ( The Babbo Cookbook ) in NYC. There are several forewords, including one by Mario Batali himself and Colum Sheehan, wine director of Babbo. Gina's thorough introduction includes her own earliest memories of her Nonni's kitchen and growing up in a Italian-American family that still revolved around the Italian style of shopping and cooking. She includes a section called Learning Italian that covers various regions, DOP and IGP origins, a recommended reading list, ten Italian ingredients you should know (some will surprise you!), and a brief, effective section on equipment. The first section is devoted to Italian cookies and includes several almond-based cookies (almond fingers, chocolate kisses, mostaccioli), semolina cookies (lemony semolina cookies), polenta cookies, chestnut brownies, and several biscottis (almond, orange and anise, mosaic, polenta and sesame). Many are light and refreshing rather than the heavy, dense, cloyingly sweet desserts that Americans prefer, and the presence of polenta gives baked goods a rather toothsome crunch that will be unfamiliar to American palates. Cakes include several gems, including grappa-soaked mini sponge cakes, citrus-glazed polenta cake, chestnut spice cake with mascarpone cream, almond and raisin cake, chocolate and walnut torte from Capri, zucchini-olive oil cake with lemon crunch glaze, yogurt cheesecake with pine nut brittle, obsessive ricotta cheesecake filled with candied orange and lemon rind, and Venetian apple cake rich with honey, spices, and polenta. The Venetian apple cake had just the right touch of sweetness from the shredded apple and honey, and the almond cake from Abruzzo was a delightful blend of toasted almonds, semolina flour, chocolate, and Amaretto. Spoon Desserts consist of bonets, custards, bavarians, panna cotta, and zabaione, many of them savory additions such as pumpkin, fresh bay leaf custards, yogurt with caramel, aged balsamic, and pine nut brittle, and a lovely cool rhubarb soup with orange and mint fior di latte that is a refreshing start to a spring or summer dinner. My favorite section was the Tarts, a personal favorite of mine. Unusual choices included a fresh cranberry tart perfect for fall, a sour cherry custard tart very similar to a French clafoutis, a blueberry and coconut tart, the divine honey and pine nut tart (you can't convince me that this isn't what angels eat!), chocolate and polenta tart (obscenely good with a scoop of gelato), and fruit tarts (fig, lemon, apple crumb, hazelnut and grape). The next section sounded good, but lacking an ice cream maker, I was unable to try out any of the ice creams or sorbets. However, if/when I do purchase one, the fig and ricotta gelato, ginger honey gelato, and espresso cinnamon gelato are tops on my list. I don't eat fried foods, so I haven't had the chance to sample any of these firsthand. Fried treats include fritters (pumpkin, herbed goat cheese, lemon ricotta, apple), Florentine doughnuts with vanilla custard, Neapolitan doughnuts with warm chocolate sauce, and cream puffs. Ways with Fruit includes traditional fruit-and-alcohol combinations such as strawberries in Chianti, Balaton cherries with grappa and mascarpone, white peach and prosecco gelatina, honey-baked figs stuffed with walnuts, sweet apple omelet, and marmelades (Meyer lemon and spiced blood orange). Celebrations includes holiday dishes such as St. Joseph's Day cream puffs (served on the feast day of St. Joseph, March 19), Easter egg bread, sweet grape focaccia (served at the annual grape harvest), chocolate "salami" (relax, vegetarians, it's made out of chocolate and nuts and rolled in powdered sugar to look like casing!), panforte (a traditional fruit-and-nut-stuffed bread from Siena) and pandoro (sweet Christmas breads). The final chapter, Savory Bites, includes breadsticks, taralli (similar to pretzels), semolina and sesame crackers, calcioni, and cheese puffs (Gina includes notes on her favorite Italian cheeses). Dolce Italiano is an absolutely gorgeous cookbook that is unparalleled in terms of culinary technique, the quality of Gina's experiences in and out of various kitchens, and the delicious end results, whether sweet or savory. The only potential downside is difficulty in locating specific Italian ingredients such as millifiori honey, decent grappa, Piedmontese hazelnuts, fresh chestnuts and chestnut flour, fresh (not commercial) ricotta and mascarpone cheeses, "OO" flour, aged balsamic (although I've had luck at Zingerman's Deli in Ann Arbor, [...]) and Sicilian pistachios, although Gina includes a "Sources" section at the back of the book (that is, if you don't mind the expense of having your cheese overnighted from NYC!!). If you're a fan of Italian / Mediterranean cuisine, you owe it to yourself to add this to your collection, presto. This is a beautiful cookbook that will bring you hours of enjoyment as you discover traditional Italian desserts that combine sometimes unlikely pairings that result in taste bud-tickling creations that taste like something your Italian grandmother would have baked.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Superb Reference on Italian Dessert Recipes and Techniques
*by B***D on November 9, 2007*

`Dolce Italiano, Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen' by Babbo pastry chef, Gina DePalma is another in a long list of cookbooks from high end restaurant pastry chefs such as Sherry Yard (Spago), Kate Zuckerman (Chanterelle), and Emily Luchetti (Stars). And, like all of these other superior books, Mme. DePalma offers far more than a simple presentation of recipes. While both Yard's `Secrets of Baking' and Zuckerman's `The Sweet Live' both serve as excellent manuals on baking in general, and Yard's latest `Desserts by the Yard' is a great culinary memoir with even greater recipes (as well as a great source of recipes for Austrian classics), DePalma takes yet another route by presenting a serious reference on shopping for, baking, and serving Italian dessert specialties. A jaded reader of Italian cookbooks has some right to be just a bit skeptical that Mario Batali's employee Ms. DePalma, a better than average restaurant chef (not yet at the heights of the Wolfgang Puck's Sherry Yard), can come up with a better than average book on her well-travelled subject. But, she does succeed and I am happy to have this book among all these other distinguished books. To be sure, Ms. DePalma does cover much familiar ground, but starts to broaden her appeal when she adds discussions of desserts and wines to her narrative, with the assistance of the very impressive credentials of the Babbo wine experts, lead by employer Joseph Bastianich. In fact, she mentions a major Italian staple, vin cotto (cooked wine), which has escaped my attention in all these readings. In a nutshell, it tends to fit many of the same roles as the far more expensive balsamic vinegar. While this book will not serve as a complete baking manual, it has many sections of truly superb instruction on how to do some basic Italian cooking procedures, as in her three page sidebar on `Pastry Crust 101'. Having read everyone from Martha Stewart to Rose Levy Beranbaum to Nick Malgieri on making basic pie crust, I amazingly find Ms. DePalma's description to be one of the pedagogically most satisfying. In plainer words, she says the same things, but the way she describes them make the subject easier to understand if you are a beginner. For a Brooklyn girl, her insights into Italian cuisine are often as interesting and as profound as her boss, the orange-clogged Batali. One observation is especially acute, when she notes that unlike many Americans, the crust to a pastry is at least as important to Italians as what you put in that crust. This is entirely consistent with their passion for the quality of breads and pasta, giving them equal attention as the more splashy sauces and toppings which go with the spaghetti or the pizza. And, like the French, there are many desserts which may be no more than two exquisitely prepared ingredients, the crust and a fruit jelly, jam, or preserve. This is yet another instance of the Italian genius for prepared and preserved intermediates, adding fruit preserves to the list of wines, cheeses, breads, vinegars, salumis, and pastas which make Italian cuisine appear so effortless and yet so great. While virtually all the recipes in the book were developed to be served at Babbo, they still represent a superb reference for so many classic Italian sweets. Some leading examples are biscotti, ricotta cheesecake, zucchini cake, panna cotta, zabaione, baked polenta, breadsticks, panforte di Siena, and strufoli. The only major Italian dessert I did not find were the iconic canolis. The book's design leans just a bit toward the budget-conscious, as all the color pics of the desserts are in a few centrally bound rotogravure signatures, rather than right next to the recipe. I also miss illustrations of the basic kitchen tools and graphic instructions on the otherwise excellent tutorials on technique. And yet, I was immediately impressed with Ms. DePalma's excellent map of Italy with all its major political regions and cities plainly and clearly laid out. It could have used just a bit more detail, such as pointing out the location of the Amalfi coast (south of Naples), the source of Italy's best lemons. Like Ms. Yard and Ms. Zuckerman, Gina has a way with her words in putting together her recipes and procedures. All procedures are effortlessly detailed and all ingredients such as type of fruit, vinegar, wine, of flour, are precise, without being arcane. She is also so kind as to recommend methods for both garnishing the dessert and storing the leftovers. In case this is not obvious, there is very little in this book about bread baking. For that, I suggest (as does Miss DePalma) that you go to Carol Field's classic `The Italian Baker'. And, a thank you to Mario for suggesting to Miss Gina that she write this very worthy book.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Brava Ms. DePalma
*by A***G on October 17, 2011*

I am so glad to have found this wonderful treasure! Studying it has become my new hobby. Along with her own entertaining memories & comments, the author has chosen delicious recipes and added the detail & history that I love to learn about regional Italian cooking. I have never been a great baker, but everything I have made from this book has turned out just delicious. I decided to purchase a dozen copies for holiday gifts & I can hardly wait to share these recipes with friends & family. You can just sense DePalma's expertise & passion on every page. I only hope there will be a 2nd book.

## Frequently Bought Together

- Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen
- The Babbo Cookbook

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