In case words are too difficult for you to manage or you're a 13-year-old girl with an iPhone (you know, when I was your age...), Yelp has just made things a little easier on you.
Now, instead of actually typing words like "pizza" or "hamburger" in the search box when you want to find a restaurant, all you have to do is type an emoji. You know, those little pictographs invented in Japan and now available on just about any smart phone.
The system seems to work pretty well for pizzerias, hamburger joints and ice cream parlors, but avid emoji users will immediately recognize possible shortcomings of the system. How, for instance, is one to find a Mexican restaurant when there's no taco or burrito emoji available? What good is that damn flan emoji? And what happens if you search for something random like, oh, I don't know, that eminently useful Easter Island head?
We did the research so you don't have to.
First, you're probably going to want to download the Yelp app, because attempting to search on the full website gets messy. You will, of course, want to delete the app as soon as you're done playing with the emoji thing, because we have much better restaurant recommendations right here.
Next, try a search.
The first hit on this is Luigi's Pizzeria (a current contender for most underrated pizza in Houston), followed by Gotham Pizza, Piola, and Ponzo's Italian food, all of which are in close proximity to the Houston Press office, where I'm currently searching. Other perhaps more obvious restaurants like Dolce Vita, Pink's, Pizza L'Vino and Star Pizza also come up, but they aren't as close to my current location.
So far, so good. I've got Double Trouble, Doshi House, Ben's Beans and Southside Espresso all nearby. Nary a Starbucks in sight (though I know there are several closer than these local options).
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