Amazing/Useful/Pointless new Food and Dining Apps for the I-Phone

In our new modern age, every coming week offers ton of new apps made available to i-Phone users. And while Food and Dining apps may not be as plentiful as, say, arcade game apps staring ninja pandas, there are still a lot of options out there, and it can sometimes be a lot to wade through. Here's a breakdown of prominent new food and dining apps from the past two months:

The Amazing:
The Epicurious App — It’s no secret that Epicurious.com is a great resource for recipes from some of the best food glossies of past and present. While finding and printing out a recipe at home is a simple task, the Epicurious app allows you the convenience of not having to plan your trip to the grocery store. With Epicurious on your I-phone, you can walk into Whole Foods, pick up an ingredient, and plan an entire meal around it on the fly, Iron-Chef style. Price: Free

The Bionic Eye -- There are certain situations in which even the most adept foodie finds themselves in unfamiliar territory, and in search of a solid meal. The Bionic Eye uses the GPS system on the I-phone 3GS to enable you to point your phone's camera down any street, and it will find the nearest resources and points of interest around you with directions. If you're ever on lunch break from Jury Duty downtown by the courthouse, or staying at a hotel on a business trip in a foreign town, having this app will easily point the way to a variety of dining destinations. Unfortunately, for now, The Bionic Eye is most adept at finding chain restaurants, but hey, sometimes the devil you know is better than the devil you don't.

The Useful:

The Chipotle App -- The perfect tool for those extra slothful burrito lovers who can't be bothered to move five feet from the couch to their computer and place an order online at Chipotle.com. The Chipotle app has a clean, easy interface that lets you quickly and precisely pick your fillings, pay, and place the order for delivery without even having to whip out your credit card or talk to a delivery person. Couch Potatoes, rejoice! Price: Free.

Open Table App: Again, like the Chipotle app, if you have a computer nearby, there's no real reason to use this app over the actual website. But, I-phone apps have always been more about privilege than practicality, and this is no exception. Just imagine the value of this for businessmen chatting up women at a bar -- with just a few key strokes, they can surprise their lady friends with reservations at the newest hotspots just seconds after she mentions a desire to go there! Sneaking off to the bathroom to fiddle with the phone's web browser, or calling assistants and yelling at them to get that coveted resy, are now things of the past! Price: Free

The Pointless:

The Starbucks App: Want to arrange a coffee date with your friends at Starbucks via your phone, in a way that is more convoluted than texting them or even calling them? There's an app for that. The Starbucks app also has full updated menus, and a series of fields that lets you mix and match ingredients to create your own virtual drinks that you can share with friends via texts. As if it were necessary, the Starbucks app can also help you find a location near you. Groan. Price: Free.
The Yelp App: For years, disgruntled diners actually had to leave the restaurant to complain about it on yelp. With the Yelp I-Phone App, diners can slag off restaurants tableside! Price: Free.