Crazy Chefs

The game is very similar to the shopping list game. Each child picks a finished meal card to cook. Then all of the ingredient cards and utensil cards are placed fat down on the table. Each player takes it in turns to turn a card over and check to see if it is on their place mat. If not they show it to everyone else in case they have it on their card, and turn it face down on the table. Each person takes their turn and continues this until you have all of the ingredients and utensils on your card. Then you turn to the game spinner. On this are different pictures including a plate which needs to be spun first so they can win one of the plate pieces to put their food on. Next they need to spin and land on the waiting child picture, so they can wait for their game to cook. Finally they need to plate their food up and eat their meal. The winner is the first person to achieve all these steps and place their food on the plate. Opinion This game is perfect for teaching young children to wait and take turns, helps boost their memory skills and introduces them to everyday items. While introducing them to all these different things they still manage to make it a fun game that your child will want to play over and over again. As there are seven pieces to find on each card to find and five cards in total I do feel it can be hard for younger children to remember a massive 35 cards where theirs are after they are picked. For this reason I do have to set this up for them especially if only two are playing. By removing a few of the cards and their matching pieces it simplifies it for my children two, four and five. As they get older it can become more challenging as they will have to remember all the cards, but for now this is how we play it. Just like other games in the Orchard range we found this was perfect for all the family to play. It is more complicated with more players so we tend to stick to two or three of us playing at once as the children are so young. It is not a game I dread playing over and over again, and I am happy when this is picked out of the board games as I actually enjoy it. It is practical for younger children but still has a lovely family appeal as we can all play it together. The items are all clearly marked on the card in fun illustrations so they are recognisable to children and fun. The bright colours are engaging so they hold little ones attention while introducing them to new things. Little touches like having to place the finished meal in the chefs waiting hands seem to be amazing to my children. They still giggle each time they complete their meal and place it in the hands. This is another fantastic addition to our set from this range. It is more complicated than shopping list, and can be rather hard if all the pieces are put into play. The pieces are small so again they can be lost easily so you need to be very careful with them. Even at the full retail of £8 this is a fantastic toy that seems to appeal to each and every child that comes to play. It is simple yet interesting for younger children and still promotes a range of educational skills which is great. I would highly recommend this to anyone with young children as it is the perfect board game.

I bought this game to play with my 3boys ages 4,6 and 10. My 4 and 6year old love it and it has helped them both with turn taking which seems to be an issue in our house. My 10yr old claims he is too old for this game, but will play occasionally on his brothers request and clearly enjoys it. Just a side note: The game is very similar to Orchard Toys Shopping List game, which could be either a positive or negative. If you already own the Shopping List game and are looking to purchase a different game from Orchard, I would recommend purchasing something different to this one, due to the similarities. However it is a great game and this is a small gripe. All the game pieces are made of very thick cardboard so its pretty durable. The pictures are fun and colourful and there is a good variety of ingredients and things to 'cook', from cupcakes to kebabs. The game: Each player picks a chef board which has 7different ingredients/ utensils on them and a meal, the initial aim of the game is to collect all the ingredients on your board from the cards which are face down in the middle of all the players. If you pick up an ingredient/utensil that you need then you place it on your board, if it isn't one you need you let the other players see it and place it back face down on the table (the idea is that the player that does need this item needs to memorise where it was placed in order to pick it up on their turn). Each player takes turns. Once a player his filled their board with their ingredients they then need to spin a spinner on their next turn.... they first need to spin a plate which they place on their board and on their next turn they need to 'cook' their meal which happens when you spin the spinner and land on a picture of a 'child eating'.... the first person to cook their meal is the winner of the game. When this happens you put a picture of your finished recipe onto the plate and Game play continues until all players have cooked their meal. The game is quite simple and fun but does feel a little like the latter part of the game is an add on and 'a bit pointless' as said by my 10yr old! he said it would be better to not have the spinner at all and just find the ingredients. However this is a small complaint and overall, all age groups of our family enjoyed this game which is always a positive thing. It encourages memory, turn taking, observational skills and could even encourage children to try new foods. I would recommend this game and it has a well deserved 5stars. So far we have loved all games we have purchased from the Orchard Toys range.

Grat family game, easy to play

Bought for grandchild 4yrs old. Good quality game & enjoyable. You can trust Orchard Toys to deliver the goods- good education concept good game.

We have a number of Orchard Toys that we bought for my 4 year old daughter, and this again lives up to expectations in terms of being fun to play for all ages. It's easy to learn how to play, and unusually, has spaces for 5 people to play, so Mum, Dad, Grandma & Grandad can all play along with our daughter. The nice thing about Crazy Chef's is that there is still an element of luck to the game, so even if you have all your ingredients, there is still a chance for another player to beat you. This is definitely one of my daughter's favourite games, and as we've come to expect with an Orchard Toy, is of high quality construction and easy to pack away.

This was fun game which our grandson loved playing. He knew all the items and loved spinning the wheel to win the plate

I normally don't write reviews, but this time I thought I'd take the time to appreciate this company. After all I heard that one can measure the quality of service not during the purchase but post-purchase. We received the game with a piece missing. After filling out a simple form we recieved the missing piece in no time. Apart from that, the game is very educational, fun and kids really enjoy playing it.

I bought this for my intelligent 4 year old daughter for christmas. She loves cooking and is pretty quick at grasping concepts; we have shopping list,spotty dogs and the ladybird games which she loves so I thought this sounded like a good bet. however, it is very complicated, certainly for a four year old and there is no room for creativity ( I had thought there might be the opportunity for making up silly meals but no). We have only played it once so far, so it may yet surprise me, but i can't imagine it... Basically, there are 5 set dishes to make - like spagetti, or kebabs, so the first stage is to collect the ingredients cards (like memory, which doesn't work so well with just 2 players).. then you have to spin the spinner to collect the last 2 cards and finish the game. In my opinion having these different stages makes it rather clumsy to play and if one loses any parts it would be impossible....I will persevere though, otherwise it is a waste...