Restaurant Apps

Zagat

Zagat’s printed guides have long been known as great sources of information for restaurants in the US, and now they’ve expanded to London you can access all of that expertise via their free app.  By providing your location it will give you a list of local restaurants, each rated for food, décor, service and average cost.  It also has a newsfeed with weekly food and restaurant news and themed reviews such as the most inventive Bloody Mary in London or the best food van in the city.

Urbanspoon

The go to app these days for restaurants, it also uses the iPhone’s GPS to work out restaurants local to you, but then also has a wide variety of general options to choose from, divided into type of cuisine, pricing, meal served or special picks from top chefs or Urbanspoon reviewers, or you can shake your phone and it gives a random restaurant in the area.  Each eatery is given a percentage based on user and critic reviews.  It provides photos, the address and phone number and sometimes even the menu.  It really is comprehensive.

Foodspotting

For those who are a bit more visual in their choices, Foodspotting provides a sort of Instagram feed of meals.  User submitted pictures of food in your local area are presented to you to like or dislike.  You thus concentrate on dishes over restaurants, and if you have one particularly good meal in a certain restaurant you can snap it and post it as a recommendation to others. A nicely quirky way to look for a good meal.