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Cafe World developer Zynga has added three Mother’s Day items to the game’s gift tab. Like all gift tab items, this trio of new additions is free to send. Sounds like a pretty easy way to score some points with any Cafe World-playing moms out there, if you ask us!

The three additions are: Mother’s Day Candy Box, Mother’s Day Cookies, and Mother’s Day Teddy Bear. These items don’t have a listed expiration date, but it is probably safe to assume they won’t be around much longer after the 9th, so players should send these exclusive gifts now, while they still can.

Restaurant City’s Japanese-themed updates finally concluded this week, replaced with another set of ethnic decorations and menu items. A large collection of Mexican Taqueria items are now available! What better way to celebrate Cinco de Mayo?

To kick things off, new starters, main dishes, and deserts have been added to the Restaurant City menu. Players can now learn, level-up, and serve Tostadas, Beef Enchiladas, and Mexican Flan. Only one of the three recipes requires beans. Who knew?

New indoor decorations include: Mexican Table, Cactus Chair, String of Chiles, Mexican Spice Rack, Cactus Juice, Cacti Jose, and a Tortilla Stove. The highlight of the new items is undoubtedly the fully-animated Mariachi band, though. The Los Santo Bros. (as Playfish calls them) cost an impressive 90,000 coins. In addition to just looking cool, they also raise customer patience by +1 second.

New outdoor decorations include a Sombrero Roof, an outdoor mariachi band, and Cactus Jose (Cacti Jose’s brother perhaps?).

No word on whether this Mexican theme will carry over into next week like the Japanese theme did, but given that Cinco de Mayo isn’t until next Wednesday, it seems like a pretty reasonable guess.

Hit the jump for an image gallery of all the new Mexican items.
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Cafe World developer Zynga added a nifty new social feature to their hit restaurant title today, giving players more reason to visit and interact with their friends’ cafes.

Now, when visiting a neighbor’s cafe, players are given the opportunity to add spices to one of their dishes. These spices are free of charge, and aren’t taken from a player’s personal spice supply. Neighbor stoves can even be spiced by players that haven’t completed their own spice racks, yet.

Players can only spice one stove per neighbor per day, and the spice they receive is random. Besides just being a neighborly thing to do, players also receive a bonus for spicing up their neighbor’s dishes. A small amount of coins and cafe cash are awarded for each neighbor spicing, and other, bigger bonuses can occasionally be earned as well. In our tests, we earned a spice rack part for helping our neighbor out.

All in all, this feature reminds us of when farm plot fertilizing was first added to Farmville. It’s good to introduce more incentives to encourage players to visit and help their friends. Features like this help make social games feel more social.

Restaurant City developer Playfish added another batch of Japanese-themed items this week. This is the third week in a row Playfish has stuck with the Far East theme for their restaurant title. Perhaps players should get used to more long-term item updates, instead of receiving a brand new themed update every Thursday? Flagship Zynga title Farmville is also running a long-term Asian-themed item expansion, this month.

The first update seemed to focus on general sushi bar decor, and last week’s update revolved around zen garden decor. This week the loose theme seems to be technology and more modern Japanese decor, although there are a few exceptions. New items include: animated Ad Post, Giant Red Maki, Giant Sakura Mochi, Octopus Statue, Dance Arcade game, Monster Robot, and Hello Bunny.

Players can also decorate the outside of their restaurant with a new Japanese Billboard, Neon Signs, Mount Fuji, and Tokyo Tower.

Restaurant City developer Playfish broke the mold this week, and stayed with the Japanese theme it first introduced last week. Normally, every week is a brand-new set of items, adhering to a new theme.

While the theme might not have changed, there are still lots of new items for Restaurant City fans to purchase. New additions include: Toy Egg Machine, Zen Gazebo, Zen Garden Pond, Zen Waterfall, Garden Fireplace, Garden Lamp, Stone Lantern, Japanese Sliding Door, and several more.

The only new outdoor decoration is a Manga Figurine.

With the bulk of this week’s new items having an outdoor flavor, players should have everything they need to build a Japanese Zen Garden.