dēliciōsus

Delicious comes from the Old French delicious, from the Latin dēliciōsus (delightful, pleasure-giving), from dēliciae (delight, pleasure, charm), from dēlicere (to allure, to entice — from dē, 'away,' and lacere, 'to lure'). The word entered English in the fourteenth century meaning 'highly pleasing to any of the senses.' A landscape could be delicious. Music could be delicious. A breeze could be delicious. The word was not about food.

The narrowing to taste happened gradually from the sixteenth century onward. By the eighteenth century, delicious was used primarily for flavors. The earlier, broader sense survived in poetry — Keats wrote of 'delicious diligent indolence' — but in everyday speech, delicious became a food word. The word that meant 'giving any kind of pleasure' was reduced to 'tasting good.'

In 1880, an Iowa farmer named Jesse Hiatt discovered a chance seedling apple in his orchard. He called it Hawkeye. Stark Nurseries bought the rights and renamed it the Delicious apple. The Red Delicious and Golden Delicious varieties became the most widely grown apples in America. The word delicious became a proper noun — and then, ironically, the Red Delicious became one of the least flavorful apples commercially available, bred for appearance and shelf life rather than taste.

The Latin root dēlicere (to allure, to lure away) connects delicious to delicate, delight, and delicacy. All involve attraction. A delicacy is an attractive food. Delight is being lured into pleasure. Delicious is the state of being lured. The word is always about being drawn toward something — and the thing doing the drawing turned out, most often, to be food.