Jamie Oliver Game Giveaway

I’ve never really been much of a gamer. My brother and I shared an Atari when we were kids—it was our first and last video game system. While everyone else moved on to Super Mario Brothers, my gaming development was arrested at Pong. Not that there were ever really any games I was interested in playing, frankly. I didn’t like blowing things up, or running away from objects that were trying to blow me up. I preferred playing outside, reading books and decorating cakes.

But video games aren’t just for kids anymore. And they aren’t just about blowing things up, either. I love the Wii because it simulates real, physical action—perfect for rainy days or late-night decompressing. I’ve actually improved my golf swing goofing around on it. What’s Cooking? Jamie Oliver is like the Tiger Woods golf game for foodies and junior foodies, designed for the hand-held Nintendo DS. Released last October, What’s Cooking? Jamie Oliver is a cooking training game complete with 100 of the Naked Chef’s recipes. Oliver guides you through timed cooking challenges as you chop, whisk and serve his creations. And you have beautiful pictures to guide you. It’s gourmet gaming! And when you’re ready, you can put the DS down and listen to the instructions while you prepare the meal for real. There’s also room to store 100 more of your own recipes, a virtual “test kitchen” to try them out, and a shopping list mode so you can tote your DS to the market instead of that crumpled piece of paper. What’s Cooking? Jamie Oliver is almost like getting to learn to cook with a famous chef, minus the sharp knives and the rolling boil of berating epithets that usually fly around a professional kitchen.

I’m giving away four copies of the new Nintendo DS game, What’s Cooking? Jamie Oliver courtesy of our friends at Cookstr. Remember Cookstr? The site is a virtual repository of recipes from chefs and cookbook authors that is fast-replacing a lot of the recipe sites I’ve bookmarked over the years (though, surprisingly, it’s got me to buy more cookbooks, not less). It’s like having Nancy Silverton, Suzanne Goin and Mario Batali’s brains at my fingertips. I’ve found dozens of great recipes on the site, including the one for the crystallized grapefruit zest I made with my grapefruit and black pepper sorbet.

So how do you win? It’s as easy as scrambling an egg. To enter, post a comment here about which famous chef you’d like to learn to cook from. Your comment must be posted by 11:59 PM on February 28, 2009. For an extra entry, Twitter about the giveaway, then comment again here with a link to your Tweet. Winners will be chosen at random. Sorry, US residents only.