Video games are usually thought of as competing with family meal times and healthy eating. However, there are many games that develop a good relationship with food and cooking. The games in this list have been selected because cooking is an element of the game play or because they are set in a context where meals and mealtime is important.Some of the games in this list, like Zelda Breath of the Wild require players to make up different recipes for a functional advantage. Other games, like Inbento, use food as a theme for a puzzle. Then there are games like Venba that use food as a cultural and story-telling element.The games have in common that food is important. They offer an unusual way to inspire how food is prepared, shared and enjoyed. This might be to come up with new ingredient combinations for flavour or (maybe) the chemistry of how different recipes work.
This list includes 20 games from the last 9 years, with 393 likes. They come from a range of different genres and play-styles and are all good games if you want to inspire young chefs.
We have other educational lists of games:
Content Rating: PEGI 12
Skill Rating: 11-18 year-olds
Release Date: 03/03/2017
Platforms: Switch and Wii U
Genres: Action, Adventure, Fighting, Narrative, Open World and Simulation
Accessibility: 11 features
Developer: @Nintendo
Players: This is a single player game
This game departs from the previous Zelda formula with the scale and depth of its world. You walk, fly, ride and climb your way through a landscape that varies in climate, terrain, inhabitants and vegetation. Weather and the passage of the sun and moon...
Content Rating: PEGI 3
Skill Rating: 2-6 year-olds
Release Date: 01/01/2019
Platforms: Android and iOS
Genres: Action, Open World, Role-Playing and Simulation
Developer: @TocaBoca
The Toca Boca, Toca Life, series of games comprise what are essentially toys in electronic form. They build on the Sago Mini games for 6-10-year-old children. Recreating interactive everyday settings like shopping, hospital,...
Release Date: 27/09/2020
Price: Free
Platforms: Android, PC, PS4 and iOS
Genres: Action, Adventure, Narrative, Open World and Role-Playing
Accessibility: 22 features
Developer: @GenshinImpact
Players: You can play this with 4 players online
Genshin Impact is a role-playing adventure set in a fantastical open world you explore by walking, climbing, swimming and gliding as necessary. Like the Zelda games, you can collect items, and craft new weapons. However, in this game to create a party...
Content Rating: PEGI 7
Skill Rating: 6+ year-olds
Release Date: 12/11/2020
Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4 and PS5
Genres: Creative, Puzzle and Simulation
Accessibility: 18 features
Developer: @YoungHorses
Bugsnax is a whimsical adventure where you track, trick, catch and eat anthropomorphic food in all shapes and sizes. But as you do, you literally become what you eat. It's silly puzzling fun from the creators of [link to game/Octodad+Dadliest+Catch...
Expected Content Rating: PEGI 3
Release Date: Coming soon
Platforms: PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S
Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Role-Playing and Strategy
Accessibility: 23 features
Developer: @CoatSink
Players: You can play with 2 players in the same room
Moonglow Bay is a role play game where you play a rookie angler. Unlike other slice-of-life games, fishing isn't tucked away as a side quest here, it's front and centre. Set along the Canadian coastline in the 1980's, you live in a fishing town that has...
Release Date: 18/08/2020
Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4, Stadia, Switch and Xbox One
Genres: Action, Adventure, Narrative, Open World, Platform and Simulation
Accessibility: 7 features
Developer: @ThunderLotus
Spiritfarer is a boat building exploration game. Unusually though, you play Stella, ferry master to the deceased and the boat you manage takes them to the next life.
Skill Rating: 9-12 year-olds
Release Date: 05/06/2018, updated in 2020
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS
Genres: Creative and Simulation
Developer: @TapBlaze
Good Pizza, Great Pizza is a simulation game where you run your own Pizza shop, fulfilling orders from customers while making enough money to keep your shop open. You can upgrade your shop with new toppings and equipment to compete against your...
Release Date: 03/12/2020
Platforms: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S
Genres: Action, Fighting, Narrative and Open World
Developer: @TheGameBakers
Haven is an adventure about companionship and exploration in space. As star-crossed lovers Yu and Kay, you escape to a forgotten planet to stay together and set up home against the odds. You explore the world around you, able to glide over the plains,...
Content Rating: Not rated by PEGI
Release Date: 14/06/2020
Platforms: PC
Genres: Action, Adventure, Narrative, Open World and Simulation
Developer: @AmongTreesGame
Among Trees is a game you play in a forested wilderness full of creatures and fauna. It's handcrafted by a small team and creates a vibrant world to explore. This isn't a game you aim to win or dominate, but rather find your place in.
Platforms: Mac and PC
Genres: Adventure, Creative, Puzzle and Strategy
Developer: @TinyBuild
Potion Craft is a puzzle adventure game where you create potions in an ancient looking workshop. More than learning recipes, your potions need to strategically combine the qualities of each ingredient to explore the potion-map and create brews to help...
Skill Rating: 7-13 year-olds
Release Date: 07/08/2018, updated in 2018
Price: 50% off
Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S
Genres: Action and Puzzle
Accessibility: 25 features
Developer: @Team17Ltd
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room and up to 4 players online
Overcooked, Overcooked 2 and Overcooked! All You Can Eat are collaborative cooking games for up to 4 players. You must keep talking to other players to coordinate the various elements of the dishes. It starts simply enough but soon gets more complicated...
Release Date: 05/10/2012
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Puzzle and Simulation
Developer: @Chubigans
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room
Cook, Serve, Delicious! is a series of three games where you run a restaurant. You have full control over how you improve your restaurant and what food or drink you want to sell. Each game plays in a similar way, adding new locations, challenges and modes.
Release Date: 08/05/2018, updated in 2021
Platforms: Android, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Narrative, Puzzle and Role-Playing
Accessibility: 24 features
Developer: @Sareptastudio
You nurture a Lebensborn child in Norway after World War II who faces a hostile community because they’ve been born to parents of both occupied and occupying forces. With meagre resources yourself, you must feed, clothe and bathe the child, but more...
Release Date: 21/09/2018
Price: 65% off
Platforms: PC, PS4 and Switch
Genres: Open World, Role-Playing and Strategy
Developer: @RisingStarGames
Little Dragons Cafe is a strategy game about running a cafe. Unlike other farming and friendship games you don't have to earn money or toil to gain ingredients. Simply explore, collect and cook. It's a farming gaming without the stress.
Release Date: 27/02/2018
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC and iOS
Genres: Action, Adventure, Creative, Fighting, Open World, Simulation and Strategy
Developer: @JasonRohrer
Players: This is a single player game. You can play with up to 100 players online
This is a civilisation survival game where each player lives a whole life in an hour of play and then passes away. Born as a baby into the care of anonymous other online players, you initially depend on them for food. Quickly growing, you can soon fend...
Platforms: PC and Switch
Genres: Creative and Strategy
Developer: @ArmorGameStudio
Bear and Breakfast is a strategy game where you build a bed and breakfast in the woods. You play as an aspiring bear host, renovating a dilapidated area in town into one fit for tourists. However there is an underlying darkness in the woods and you are...
Release Date: 28/11/2021
Genres: Narrative and Puzzle
Developer: @TmoritaA
Venba is a narrative-cooking game about an Indian mother who immigrated to Canada in the 1980s. You cook various traditional Indian dishes and restore the lost recipes which were damaged in the move to Canada. As you talk to your mother's family you...
Release Date: 12/03/2020
Price: 30% off
Platforms: Android, Switch and iOS
Genres: Puzzle and Turn-Based
Developer: @AfterburnGames
Inbento is a food-themed puzzle game where you solve puzzles to prepare lunch boxes. As you complete each "bento" lunch box a story unfolds about the highs and lows of parenthood. There are over 100 fun puzzles, aesthetically served with traditional...
Release Date: 29/08/2019
Price: 90% off
Platforms: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One
Genres: Action, Puzzle and Simulation
Accessibility: 16 features
Developer: @FoggyBoxHQ
Brunch Club is a cooking game where you possess and move food around the kitchen to complete different recipes. This unusual way to cook creates a unique and silly challenge you take on with up to four people.
Skill Rating: 2-10 year-olds
Release Date: 22/02/2020
Developer: @Cowlyowl
Sizzle & Stew is a cooking game where you don’t have to follow the rules. It’s a lot of fun and works well in the two-player split-screen mode. Experiment as you explore all the kitchen gadgets to make a meal, or just see what happens when you put a...
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