2018 brought us the bagel emoji. And we are so excited to report that 2019 will bring us the falafel emoji.
Unicode Consortium, which controls the new emojis, announced today a list of 230 new emojis for 2019. Among them are a yawning face, a host of emojis for people with disabilities, a guide dog, gender inclusive couples — and what they call a “falafel emoji.” (You can see it here.) So far, the only version that has been released is the “Emojipedia” version — typically, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Samsung, Twitter, and other major tech companies release their own versions of the standard emoji as well.
However, we take some issue with this. Yes, it’s exciting we’re getting a falafel emoji, but honestly, it doesn’t look that great. Here at The Nosher, we called the bagel emoji “the saddest carb ever” – but the bagel emoji at least looks like a bagel. The falafel emoji bears little resemblance to the deep-fried chickpeas we know and love.
Some what does it look like? Some colleagues suggested it looks like potatoes or croquettes. Another colleague called it coconuts, and yet another said “those are straight-up German marzipan potatoes” (which I had to google, and I kinda agree).
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Yet a fifth colleague gave a (convincing) conspiracy take: “Given the existence of falafel in pita emoji” — yes, there’s a stuffed pita emoji already — “falafel balls in isolation is an effort to feed kids the new eggplant emoji. It’s basically emoji innuendo.” Yes, this anonymous colleague is suggesting the new falafel emoji will be used to connote balls.
Is this a win for Jewish and Israeli food representation, or a new way for people to sext? We say: why not both?
