If you're looking for new ways to explore Dallas one dish at a time, two new mobile applications are ready to feed you ideas.
Foodspotting and Chefs Feed both focus individually on dishes instead of restaurants as a whole. The first application makes use of user generated data, while the Chefs Feed's application focuses on recommendations from Dallas' most notable chefs.
When Foodspooting sent me a news release about their new app a few months ago, I was ready to do a post but the app was buggy and useless—so I scrapped it. While searching for information about a taqueria in North Dallas, though, I stumbled on the app again and gave it a second shot. It's a lot more fun this go around.
Instead of reviewing restaurants, customers snap a picture and give a simple thumbs up or down. The photo does the real talking, not some Yelp hammerhead who's disgruntled about a parking situation and takes his anger out on a bowl of under-seasoned beans.
The results are pretty cool in that they let you browse dishes and glean information that no menu ever shares (what's the gordita really going to look like when it hits my table) and reduces critical input from questionable sources to a minimum.
Chefs Feed accomplishes the same thing, but uses real-live Chefs to vet the dishes. You can log on and stalk follow Brian Luscher and his obsession with Maple and Motor Burger or find out where Teiichi Sakurai thinks you should go for a bowl of pho.
Like Foodspotting was at release, Chefs Feed seems a little glitchy. The interface is jumpy and flickers on my iPhone. It is an iPhone, though. I hear those went out of fashion recently.
