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Ten food emoji that should exist

Callan Boys
Callan Boys

The meat pie emoji.
The meat pie emoji.Dionne Gain

The emoji-developing gods at the Unicode Consortium have accepted candidates for new emoji in mid-2015. Goodfood.com.au would like to put the case forward for the following food and drink emoji to magically appear on our smartphones in the next 12 months.

Some of these are already on the Unicode shortlist, but no chicken parma emoji seems like a massive oversight.

Illustrations by Dionne Gain.

Meat pie with tomato sauce

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The meat pie drenched in tomato sauce is Australia's national dish, and I will accept no arguments on this. Surely a Four'N'Twenty emoji would get more usage at one AFL game than the VHS, fax machine, and pager emojis globally?

Champagne bottle with popping cork

A no-brainer with multiple uses. Says "I have a bottle of Pol Roger, let's get sloshed and eat caviar on Jatz" as well as it says "congratulations on receiving your cake-decorating diploma", and "here's to South Sydney winning another grand final".

Cheese wedge

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C'mon, it's cheese. Everyone loves cheese! There's supermarkets aisles, delicatessens and entire European nations devoted to the stuff. And look how sad the wine glass emoji is by itself. Everything will be okay, sad wine glass.

Bacon

Three pig emoji (four if you count the wild boar) and no pork products is a bit silly. A leg of ham would be super at Christmas time, but bacon is perennial and already instagrammed more than sunsets, plane tickets and dashboard thermometers on summer days.

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Peas in a pod

The fruit to vegetable emoji ratio is 13:5. I know the tomato is botanically a fruit, however in cooking terms it's a vegetable and the same applies to peas. Little green peas in a little green pod would not only address the issue of vegetable inequality it would also be the go-to emoji for any best-friend selfies, babies wrapped in blankets, and every now and then, the odd pea.

A flat white coffee

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There's already an emoji of steaming black liquid but who says "let's meet up for an indeterminate hot, black beverage in cup"? "Let's meet up for coffee," yeah? A milky flat white, Australia's gift to the coffee world now loved in the US, would be much better. And some tacky latte art too, thanks.

Steak

There's a "meat on the bone" emoji that looks like a hair clip of Pebbles Flintstone but it doesn't count. Combine a steak, the flame and beer emojis and you've got yourself a barbecue.

Chicken parmigiana

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As common to Australian pubs as Friday night meat raffles and upwardly mobile 20-somethings playing trivia. More texts are sent in Australia that read "keen for schnitzel?" than "keen for fish cake with swirl design?". Fact.

Hot dog

For the last half-century, American hot dogs have been infiltrating Australian culture in a Dalek-style sneak-attack. In the distant future they may overtake the meat pie as the sports snack of choice. This is a pre-emptive emoji in case that dark day comes.

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Taco

The Mexican wave of five years ago might have dwindled at bars and pubs around the country, but Tuesday night is still taco night for a lot of people. Next time you receive a text asking what's for mid-week dinner, a taco emoji is much quicker than typing "could not be bothered cooking anything ridiculous. Whip out the Old El Paso kit from the back of the cupboard, would you?".

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Callan BoysCallan Boys is editor of SMH Good Food Guide, restaurant critic for Good Weekend and Good Food writer.

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