Use of estar

Question

Hola Inma, - hopefully you will be seeing this or it can be forwarded to you :)  
 
I was glad to hear your voice.  Hope you and yours are well and the team are all well. 
1) I was interested in finding out why the author chose to use the verb "estar" instead of "ser" for
"It's delicious" regarding "harira" It seems to me this would always be "delicious"!  
(1-1: I wish I could copy/paste here, but for some reason can't.  Is there a way I could do that?
Also I like to keep track of my lessons and errors and notes etc.)
Gracias,
Nicole

Accepted Answer

Hola Nicole, -nice to hear from you again.
When we use estar with adjectives that describe taste in food, e.g. rico, delicioso, salado, soso, we are talking about what we think of its taste at the time of tasting it. Finding estar is a lot more common in this context. But we could also use ser with these adjectives, in which case, we are talking about an essential quality of that food. 
For example, I could say:

El queso halloumi es salado. 
Halloumi cheese is salty.

Here I am describing an essential quality of this cheese as it always contains salt.

El queso halloumi está salado. 
Halloumi cheese is salty.

Here I am saying that this cheese is salty because that is the taste we get when we try it. It is a result of having put salt in it, and we "sense" the salty taste.
Regarding your other queries I will pass that on to one of my colleagues who will contact you by email.
Un saludo
Inma

Answer

Maybe this would help? https://forum.wordreference.com/threads/ser-estar-rico.3137939/Also, food can spoil so I guess it's not always delicious? Haha.

Answer

Nicole - Yes, my Grammar book (by Butt and Benjamin) has a section which says that "estar" is [also] used for impression or sensation when referring to specific occasions, so "taste" and "look" (e.g. "She's looking good") are usually translated by "estar".