Delicious means tasting wonderful. A delicious meal, that was delicious, delicious smells from the kitchen.
It is the standard strong compliment about food, and it is used freely — tasty is milder, and lovely does the same job in British speech. It also describes smells, and by extension anything richly enjoyable: a delicious rumour, a delicious irony. That figurative use is slightly literary and always suggests something faintly wicked being enjoyed. Note deliciously as the adverb, which is used in exactly the same way: deliciously awkward.
1adjectivedeliciousTasting or smelling very good.
“The soup was delicious and there was none left.”
Patternabsolutely / truly delicious · delicious + noun (meal, smell) · smell / taste / look delicious
synonyms: tasty, mouth-watering, scrumptious
2adjectiverichlyRichly enjoyable, often in a slightly wicked way.
“There is a delicious irony in the whole thing.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
delicious is a quality of taste.
Also accepted in games: tasty, yummy
deLICious → you LICK the plate clean
So good that you lick the plate clean, and then ask if there is any more.
Latin deliciosus comes from deliciae, delight or pleasure. The same root gives delight and delicate, so tasting good, feeling pleasure and being finely made are all the same word underneath.
Anglo-Norman
delicious
Middle English
delicious
English, today
delicious
Built from
From Middle English delicious, from Anglo-Norman delicious. From Middle English delicious, from Anglo-Norman delicious, from Old French delicious, from Latin deliciosus (“delicate, delicious”), from dēliciae (“delights”), plural of dēlicia (“pleasure”), from delicere (“to allure, to entice”), from de- (“away”) + laciō (“to lure, deceive”), from Proto-Italic lakjō (“to draw, pull”), of unknown ultimate origin. Displaced native ārlīċ.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA