My husband groaned when he saw me shaping gyzoa in Cooking Academy. “Not another cooking game. Don't you cook enough?” One of my hobbies is baking, and I'm also interested in Asian and Italian cooking, especially low carb stuff, so he's got a point. I'm also a big fan of Cooking Mama on the Wii. “But its not just a cooking game!” I told him. “It's a cooking SIMULATION. Besides, its giving me good ideas for dinner.” He still doesn't get it. Then again, he's not much of a cook. When we first got married, he tried to surprise me by making up my favorite dish – eggplant parmigiana. Except his version was made with feta cheese. Points for trying.
Cooking Academy runs you through appetizers, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and desserts. You must pass exams in between levels, and you're graded on each recipe. You can replay recipes for better scores, so I challenge you to get all As (I'm still getting B+ on the truffles). You make foods much like you do in Cooking Mama, using the mouse as your ultimate kitchen tool. You trace lines to mix dough, add ingredients as instructed, stir and chop all manner of veggies, and bake and fry items just long enough so they're done but not burnt. It's sort of a blend of time management with an assortment of mini games.
The recipes are pretty true to life, and while you won't get exact proportions, it does give you some idea of how the actual foods are made. There's a ton of different foods to cook up too, from the common (spaghetti, burgers, and ice cream) to the exotic (crème brulee and gyzoa). Cooking Academy fills a niche for pc cooking games that some of the other cooking games just haven't managed to do. Hot Dish was fun and challenging, but extremely tough, and Family Restaurant was cute but not as deep or exciting. Cooking Academy really does the job right, with enough challenge to be tough, but still accessible to beat.
LISA
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