A quirky game from Taito has you mastering the finer arts of food preparation...with a touch screen of course.

Fans of original, quirky DS games take note: Cooking Mama is looking to deliver in a sorely underserved area of the video game industry: cooking sims. Yes, Nintendo has their own interactive cookbook on the way but its just not as cute. Preparing food in accordance with the instructions of what I am guessing is THE "Cooking Mama", players utilize the special functions of the DS such as the touch screen to chop and and prepare food. And perhaps you'll even need that microphone to blow on hot food and cool it down.

Pictures from the game can be accessed here on the just-launched Cooking Mama website. Careful though: its made me rather hungry.

Published by Taito, Cooking Mama will be released upon starving Japanese on March 23rd. No word yet on possible release in other territories, though this game would probaly find interested players in all territories due to the DS' increasingly and famously diverse userbase.