Really cool idea for a recipe book one my kids will definitely enjoy helping with.
Really liked some of the recipes just a shame there was no pictures to show what they should look like.

The Video Game Chef is a book I picked because it has amazing concept and new format for presenting recipes. But I read through this book I felt that there was not much difference between normal and this cookbook apart from few game consoles images in this.

Overall, interesting recipes!

This was an entertaining and easy read. Though I was unfamiliar with most of the games (and subsequently the foods), I still enjoyed perusing the recipes. I’m not sure if there were any recipes that I would have to try, but I appreciated the ingenuity. Well done and fun! Thank you NetGalley for the ARC!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I thought this was such a great cookbook. I love how the recipes represent different video games from the 80s-2010s. I love seeing how there are different games being represented. From PacMan to Mario Brother to Sonic the Hedgehog to Resident Evil and a lot of games that are not super popular. And how it has different "levels" on the difficultly on the recipes from beginners to expert. There are so many recipes in here that I want to try and one cookbook I am so excited for it to come out.

This cookbook has a really interesting theme that I think a lot of people would enjoy. It’d make a great gift. The art is beautiful. That being said, I think it’d be nice to have actual pictures of the food. I also didn’t feel like there was much cohesiveness across the various recipes.

Where are the photos?? I like to know that what Im making is actually doable to make. There are beautifully coloured illustrations but photos of finished products would have been much better. I also would have maybe liked to have seen some more adventurous things in the book. I felt the food choices were very 'safe'

I like the concept. This cookbook doesn’t have photos, and I just find that intolerable in my cookbooks. Some seem quite complex to not have a photo. Some like the grog seem fun and easy for a game night at least.

This is amazing!!! I can't wait to try out some of the recipes in this book. However I would have liked the recipes to be more inclusive with options for substitutes for people with food allergies and/or autoimmune diseases. The book - as is - right now is only catered to abled body people. Most of the recipes also look fairly complex with long lists of ingredients and I'm not entirely sure this is going to "speak" to a lot of gamers. I feel it's once again more catered towards the able bodied (and rich) gamers than the general population of gamers.

I appreciate what this book is doing, however, I feel I disagree with a lot of the star ratings and a lot are fairly complex or require unfamiliar ingredients. I like the brief blurb about each recipe but I really wish there were actual pictures of what the dish will look like.

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

A cookbook without photos of the food just doesn't do it for me. I am more of a visual person when it comes to cooking and the illustrations vs actual pictures is a miss for me. Especially when the recipes come from a chef who could make the dishes.

The ideas for recipes from each game are super cute though. I loved the beginner to expert levels and mods, all game themed and it would probably help get a game enthusiast who can't cook to try. The recipes are a bit of a strange mix, everything from a grilled cheese sandwich (The Sims 2) to Coq au Vin (as dated as Deus Ex). Might be nice to mention which recipes can be mix & matched for a meal.

The recipes are heavy on Asian inspired for mains and a lot of desserts. Some dishes are not really game night food (stews, a roast dinner etc) unless you are having dinner followed some games. Then some just seem really childish, like adding a "tongue" of spam to a burger for Fortnite which I would do for a 5 year old but not game night.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC

Thanks to Netgalley and Quarto publishing group for this Arc in exchange for my honest review.

Well, this book brought me down to memory lane, childhood memories of games I used to play. The recipes seem super interesting and I'd love to try more than a few. I just wished there were actual photos of the dishes, it would have been perfect then.

I'm a gamer, and I'm also a foodie who loves to cook, so seeing this cookbook in particular excited me... at first. I'm unsure if the TOC will be available online, but I heavily recommend looking at the list of recipes before buying this book, to see if it's something you'd be interested in. The recipes heavily favor JRPG games (specifically Nintendo games - lots of Nintendo), which means a lot of the dishes are Asian or Asian fusion. This also means most of the savory recipes have chilis, peppers, hot sauce, or chili oil in them, so if you have problems with spicy food, this is not the cookbook for you. There are multiple recipes from/inspired by Mario, Final Fantasy, or Zelda games.

Now to how the book is set up: there is a lot of cute usage of video game language. Each recipes has a difficulty level (there are 3), and the list of equipment needed/recommended is sorted into types like common (ex: spatula), rare (ex: grater), epic (ex: spring-form pan), or legenedary (ex: ice cream maker). This is super cute in my opinion. The book's layout is also inspired by video games - specifically pixel games of the 80s/early 90s, including the artwork. There are no actual photos of any of the recipes though, which I think is a big miss.

I appreciate the quick summation at the start of most recipes that explains the game it's inspired by/from... but what I'm really missing most is the WHY. Why this recipe? Why this game? Some recipes will give a sentence to one of these, but it felt rare, and I'd have liked it for every recipe. Or, if it does happen to answer the WHY, then it doesn't include a quick summary of the game or what it's about... confusing.

The recipes themselves are the sort of things you can typically find online (a lot of classics or twists/fusions of classics), but they're given cute video-gamey names. Some are just inspired by the game or items in the game, while others are based on food or recipes found in the game. Some, I don't understand why she chose... like the Pork and Beans for Fallout 3, or, the biggest WTF for me, the Witcher 3 recipe: Gingerbread.... Why not use one of the recipes from the game, like she does for the Deus Ex Coq Au Vin?? The blurb before the Witcher recipe even mentions what a foodie pack the Blood & Wine DLC is! You can find recipes for some of the food items in game (same as Deus Ex)! Just a weird choice for that game.

For an example of a classic, the very first recipe in the book are Power Pellets, from Pac-Man. Obviously that's not a real food, not in real life or in the game; instead the author found a food that was similar to an item in the game, in this case the pellets Pac-Man is avoiding the ghosts to collect. What are Power Pellets, though? That classic Christmas cookie - snowballs, of course! Which, to be fair, she does seem to give her own spin to in most cases.

Then there are the recipes where she gets really creative - an excellent example being the second recipe in the book: Mushrooms, from Super Mario Bros. I think the closest food I can compare it to is stromboli? But it's not really stromboli (needless to say, this is noted an ***Expert level recipe as it requires some creative construction). Sometimes the creativity goes to far though... like for the Elsweyr Fondue. I love that she went big, with one of the more fun foods from Elder Scrolls: Skyrim, but it's a blue cheese/cream cheese fondue... I like both of those and I love fondue but this turned my stomach just reading it. The whole recipe is one I'd never try because I eat all these foods separately, I know their flavors, and it does not sound good altogether. At all. The recipe feels very "throw everything and the kitchen sink" in it.

I will be making The Secret of Monkey Island Grog though (non-alcoholic for the kids to enjoy) for our next family gathering this summer! But I will never, in my life, make that nasty Peanut Cheese Bar. Cheddar, chocolate, and biscoff cookies? Gag. I don't know if this will be a book add to my cookbook collection, but I'm currently leaning towards 'no'.