Foodie Bytes (currently a Beta site) is a restaurant menu search engine. It is amazing and easy to use. Once at their site, you have a choice of logging in, or using the site as a guest.
Basically, you choose your city, and then your type of search. You can search by restaurant or by type of food. If you don't already have a place in mind, you can simply choose your city, then "food search", and type in "gluten free".
The results are sortable by neighborhood, price range, distance, and type of food (e.g. steakhouse, Mexican, etc.). You can combine, or stack, the sorts too, by adding or removing the different criteria selected. It's very simple to use. There are also customer comment areas for each food item and for each restaurant, so you can see what others thought
My favorite feature, though, is one you have to login for. You can create a login with Foodie Bytes or you can use your OpenID (if you have one). Once you log in, you get your own home page (with the option to upload a photo - if you'd like). On that home page, you can keep tabs on your item, restaurant reviews, and favorites. You can also maintain a wish list for both items and restaurants. This is my favorite part. What if you have a birthday or special occasion coming up, and people want to know where they can take you? Or what if you just want to be able to run out quickly without taking the time to go on a web search first? Just grab your wish list and go! So great.
I've now spent a few days wandering around this site, and I think it's fabulous. Each item description also lists portion sizes, type of cuisine, and the item's categories. In addition, there are links for the restaurant, the full menu, and a Google map.
Go and check them out! Their popularity is growing, and their restaurant base is excellent. It's the site I've been wishing for for months. The only drawback, for me, is that it only focuses on major cities at this point, and I don't live right in a major city. I'm hopeful, though, that they will continue to expand as their client base grows.
-Mikki
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