What iPhone apps do you reach for over and over again? What ones really do help and make your life better or easier or more entertaining?

Here are some of my faves in the dining department. I used these all regularly:

1. OpenTable: Makes life so easy. Really. If you have ever needed to make reservations for a trip and the time zones are different. If you want to see all of your choices for a particular date and time all at once and not have to call multiple restaurants, Open Table does the trick. One of my #1 most used apps. It would be a crying shame if you have a smart phone and don’t have this app.

2. LocalEats: If you don’t know much about the restaurants in a locale and want to make some decisions based on category, Local Eats is a great tool. I love knowing what the top breakfast place might be in a given city. I’m going to Detroit soon and know nothing about the food scene there. Local Eats is helping me narrow it down.

An example of the types of categorization happening on Local Eats

3. Map Muse–D, D, & D. This app is a special interest map locater that finds all of the restaurants viewed on “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives.” A friend recommended it and said they did some good eating on a family vacation driving down to Florida. I plan on giving it a work out over the next 18 months as we hit the road visiting colleges with our son.

4 & 5. Speciality apps–Starbucks and In n Out. Both these apps help me when I need it–Starbucks locates stores for me, allows me to pay on my phone and re-load my card while I wait in line, keep track of the complex drink favorites of various friends. It’s all good. In N Out is also a locater and it’s free and you never know where you might be and need to know the closest route to a classic burger! Plus check out the “not so secret” menu. An urban legend debunked.

6. Yelp. Last but not least. Yelp does help to narrow it all down! Some great restaurants don’t have web sites, but Yelp can let you know what diners think. Restaurants are just a small part of its knowledge base.

Download these now if you are human and you enjoy eating. They will only add to your enjoyment!

“The Daily Feast: Everyday Meals We Love to Share” is exactly that. This cookbook is authored by the Graber family, Esther Rose Graber and her six daughters. I picked up an autographed copy (one of my collecting quirks–autographed cookbooks) at Found, the Graber family gallery in Goshen, Indiana.

I guarantee your price per recipe used in this cookbook will be low!

I love the way the book is set up. Each family member has a section with 3 meal plans: a favorite soup supper, a favorite family supper, and a favorite guest dinner. I also love that the recipes are straightforward, have a normal number of ingredients, and explore the world of spices, flavors, and traditions. The families travels have taken them to exotic locales and it shows in their cooking. As our world gets smaller, it isn’t strange or difficult to stock kaffir lime leaves or garam masala any more and this cookbook provides plenty of opportunity to use more exotic ingredients in a context of every day cooking.

I’ve recently made The Turkish Style Chicken Kabobs, Turkish Ottoman Rice Casserole, and the Wilted Spinach Salad. My son gobbled this up and didn’t seem the wiser that I had mixed components of the family supper with the guest dinner! I’ve also been in a soup mood, so I made the Potato, Kale and Sausage Soup (using super spicy sausage and extra kale)–another hit with my son. Later this week I plan on making the Thai Ginger Chicken Soup–adding some veggies–thinking green beans and butternut squash and the Chocolate Truffle Cheesecake for a friend’s birthday.

Wow, writing all of that down made me realize how inspirational this cookbook is too. The recipes are fun, easy and delicious to make and I am thinking about hosting a fall dinner party. You can’t ask much more from a cookbook!