Peer pressure works, right? That’s what the team behind new app The Eatery, for iPhone and iPod Touch, must believe since the concept of the service is based upon letting others have input on what you eat. And, frankly, it’s not the worst idea.
The Eatery aims to increase consciousness of what you eat, when you eat it and how much of it you’re eating. Every time you eat a snack or a meal, you’re supposed to take a quick photo and upload it to the service. You can add a description, indicate your portion size, and rate it for how “fit” or “fat” you think the food choice is. There’s no “wrong” answer: It’s how you perceive healthfulness. The Eatery keeps track of how healthy you eat, as well as other patterns — maybe you eat well all day long except for a 3 p.m. snack that skews to the junk food end of the spectrum. The more you use the app, the more data available, and The Eatery team believes the more you know about your habits, the easier they will be to change — if that’s your goal.
The act of logging your food might be enough to help you change your eating habits — and the interface makes the tracking act pleasant — but The Eatery also offers a social aspect. Every image that’s uploaded is presented to The Eatery community, which then rates the image on the fit-to-fat ranking bar and sends a notification when your meal is rated. You can rate other people’s food choices in the “Fit or Fat” tab, too. If you want to see how the community is rating a certain photo, hit the comment icon (even if it says zero) to see the current feedback results as well as the location where the photo was taken.
You can connect to The Eatery via Facebook, which will let the app post your food choices to your Facebook, as well as integrate your FB friends who are also using the app. If you aren’t comfortable connecting with Facebook, you won’t be able to use the “Friends” tab or follow people, but you can still use the other features of The Eatery anonymously.
