Gastronomy Meets Ludology: Towards A Definition Of What It Means To Play With Your (Digital) Food

Playing with food is both a common taboo and a secret desire. From a young age children are taught not to play with their food but are fed in playful ways ("here comes the aeroplane"). The food we consume be it a fruit picked from a tree or an elaborate restaurant dish is full of play opportunities and recent technological advances such as miniaturized electronics and fabrication techniques have opened up a host of new potentials for play and interaction. In this paper we examine the relationship between food and play, what it means to play with your food? What are the materialities of taste and flavour in a world in which the physical and the digital are deeply intertwined and in which the senses can easily be fooled by virtual means? And what modalities of play are possible with food, drink and flavor sensations?