Nowadays you can get pretty much anything you want online, but what if you really want a burrito at three in the morning, or some hand-picked beets at three in the afternoon? There are a lot of ways to get good food out there, and the Internet is becoming an increasingly useful, and effective, way to find exactly what you want.  This list can help you find new vendors and new meals that you might have otherwise missed. From those delicious candies you once had in Germany, to the nearest farmers market, to that great sushi place just around the corner, here are a bunch of ways to help you feed yourself online.  There are two modes of thought on this one: Do you want groceries or do you want hot, prepared meals? Regardless of which you prefer, there’s a bounty of resources. If you’re looking for local organic foods, our favorite site is Greenling. Based in Texas, the company will deliver fresh produce to your door. Greenling’s site does an amazing job with its farmer info sections, including bios and farm specialty for each of their major providers. Their zip code look-up is a huge help even if you don’t live in Texas. If Greenling doesn’t deliver to your house, they’ll give you a fantastic list of available grocers who will.  One of the sites included might be Local Harvest, another online market with a wide range of produce picked from farmers markets. More established, mainstream sites like Peapod, Netgrocer, or FreshDirect can offer more name brand goods like Corn Pops or Oscar Mayer hot dogs, for example. Some of these sites, such as Peapod, even team up with major supermarkets like Stop & Shop.  Now for the hot stuff. If you want to skip the middle man-or-woman entirely, these sites can help you get cooked food delivered straight to your door. Cer té in New York is good for something a little fancier, but those looking to see if their favorite BBQ place delivers can check out GrubHub, a site now in 10 U.S. cities and still growing. Type in your address and GrubHub will tell you what’s nearby, who delivers, and other juicy details like minimum order requirements. Another useful feature lets you search by type of cuisine if all you really want is that BBQ.  Other sites like Delivery.com, Eat24Hours, SeamlessWeb, and OrderLunch.com feature similar services. Schwan’s is a little different, offering both gourmet foods and goods like fruits, veggies, and meats that can be delivered across the country.  Daily hunts used to be a big deal back in the Stone Age, when every outing was a life or death affair. Even though the stakes might have dropped, you can still hunt for those elusive mobile street vendors. While it can be difficult to find these transitory gems, there are several ways you can reliably track them down online.  If you’re just sort of peckish and looking for some good street food in your neighborhood, most major cities have a site devoted to cataloging food carts. Some good examples include AustinFoodCarts, AtlantaFoodCarts, and Food Carts Portland. Each of these sites has a surprisingly wide range of cuisines. Some are better updated than others, but a simple GoogleGoogle search should turn up your own city’s offering.  The mother lode of food cart finders is YelpYelp. With information on more than 50 U.S. cities (even some locations overseas), Yelp keeps tabs on every cart you could imagine. Simply search for “food carts/stands” and prepare to get reading. You can narrow by district, area, or type of food cart to tailor your responses.  Yelp is also a great way to read up on that cart you’ve been dying to try. If you need to follow your favorite, most major food carts have started up TwitterTwitter accounts with daily tweets about locations and specials. Another Google search can help you track them down. And the new Cartspotting website aggregates tweets from a growing number of food trucks.  If the last section left you feeling a little heavy, try walking over to a local farmers market to load up on leafy vegetables, fresh cheeses, and all sorts of healthy produce.  Farmers markets are nothing new, but their growth online makes finding them even easier. Like the food carts, many major cities have websites devoted to cataloging local farmers markets such as Farmer Net and Certified Farmers’ Market in California, or GrowNYC and the Farmers Market Federation in New York.  A great all-around resource is America’s Favorite Farmers Markets. This comprehensive site covers all of America (yes, even Hawaii and Alaska), documenting a plethora of markets nationwide. A simple zip code look-up can pinpoint the markets closest to you. Handy pop-ups provide context and some information on what is sold. A voting system keeps track of which markets top the rest.  Also check out Local Harvest for a huge listing of farmer’s markets, family farms and CSAs.  If you’re looking for some easily-shippable snacks, you really can’t go wrong with classic online stores like AmazonAmazon.com or eBayeBay. While their inclusion in this list might be puzzling, just try typing in your favorite candy, chocolate, or chips and see what pops up.  Word of advice: Because of shipping restrictions, your odds of finding a pack of Wine Gums or Yorkies are usually much higher than landing a hot meal.  Hopefully we’ve opened up some new options for our hungry readers, or finally reunited you with your favorite, hard-to-find snack. Please use the comments to let us know about more resources, or to share your success stories.  - 3 Social Media Lessons From the Restaurant World - 10 Fun iPhone Apps for Beer Lovers - Tasty Tweets: 55+ Foodies to Follow on Twitter - Top 15 Social Media Resources for Foodies - 15 More Fantastic Social Media Resources for Foodies  Image courtesy of iStockphotoiStockphoto, izanoza
Hungry? Got a computer? These resources can help you get some terrific and interesting food delivered straight from the Internet.