History Main / TastesBetterThanItLooks

* Gumbo. Many soups and stews get hit with this trope, but gumbo especially, with the broth an often grayish brown hue and spotted by lumps of whatever (vegetables plus any number of different proteins). Doesn't make it any less delicious.

* ''Series/TheGoldenGirls'' has multiple episodes in which Rose, having come from [[{{Cloudcuckooland}} St. Olaf, Minnesota]] (a strange but charming small farm town with cultural roots in Scandinavia) cooks bizarre cuisines that have some kind of quirk to them. One notable one is Sperheoven Krispies, which, according to Rose, are done cooking when the smell of them makes you want to vomit, but taste like cheesecake, chocolate ice cream, and strawberries - to eat one, she, Blanche, and Dorothy plug their noses with one hand and eat with the other.

** In the SuperS movie, Usagi and Chibiusa make cookies. Usagi's invert this, looking decent, but tasting horrible. Chibiusa's cookies are implied to play this trope straight. Fans usually takes this to mean Usagi can either make food look presentable or taste delicious, just never at the same time.

* ''Literature/BakaAndTestSummonTheBeasts'' has an [[InvertedTrope inverted case]] with Mizuki Himeiji's cooking; it ''looks'' delicious, but [[LethalChef tastes awful due to the borderline lethal ingredients she uses]].

* Mushrooms and truffles aren’t considered all that pretty, but many people think they taste divine and are prized by chefs

** In the movie "Win, Lose and Kaboom", the characters compete on an alien game show. During an eating challenge, Carl tries the disgusting-looking alien dish of brown spongy balls and finds it quite tasty. Conversely, the alien contestant finds a banana cream pie so repulsive that it causes his head to explode.

* One episode of the ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'' anime in the ''Advanced Generation'' series is about this. The main characters come across two competing restaurants whose chefs are Pokémon, a Sneasel and a Mr. Mime. The Sneasel's food looks bland but tastes great, while the food cooked by Mr. Mime [[InvertedTrope is visually appealing but tastes terrible]].

* ''LightNovel/DateALive'': "The Seventh Spirit", the first episode of season 3, starts with all the girls of Shido's {{harem|Genre}} making a stew consisting of all of their favorite foods, such as fried chicken, an ice cream cone, and a lollipop. The result is a grotesque, bubbling blob radiating a sickeningly purple color. To almost everyone's surprise, though, when Shido tastes it... it's actually pretty good. Disbelievingly, some of the girls try it and find that the taste is surprisingly pleasant.

[[folder:Light Novels]]

[[folder:Literature]]
* In ''Literature/GreenEggsAndHam'', the unnamed target of the titular dish refuses to try the PaletteSwappedAlienFood, but he eventually gives in. He takes a bite and realizes that he really, really likes green eggs and ham.
* In Creator/JamesHerriot's autobiography, ''The Lord God Made Them All'', he recounts a voyage on a Danish ship to Russia, when he was disgusted by seeing the preparation of a traditional dish involving uncooked beef and eggs, tried to hold his breath when forcing it down but accidentally inhaled, and found it was actually delicious.
* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'': In ''[[Literature/CiaphasCain Death or Glory]]'', the breakfast Jurgen makes one day is described as "gray and lumpy". It smells appetizing, and Cain comments that after eating the whatever-it-was, he felt ready for anything the day might hold, so it must have tasted good.
[[/folder]]

--->'''Calvin:''' ''[looks at the AlienLunch dinner in disgust, takes a bite, and has a WildTake reaction]''\\

'''Calvin:''' This is ''hamburger?'' ''[takes another bite]'' Hmm... ''This'' bit wasn't so bad, for some reason. [[BlatantLies I was able to choke it down, anyway. My stomach is still cramping up, but the pains aren't as sharp any more. The secret is to suppress the gag reflex. After I swallow it, I can stand it.]]\\

We all know not to judge a book by its cover, but what about food? Chances are, if something smells and looks repulsive, it'll taste just as bad. After all, how could that [[PaletteSwappedAlienFood plate of green eggs]] be anything other than rotten, or that bowl of murky, gray mush be anything other than nauseating? This is especially true if we're expected to taste something that isn't often eaten in our culture, such as a middle-class American being fed a bat--or a normal human being exposed to an AlienLunch. In many cases, a bad smell, texture, or appearance will be an immediate sign that the food should not be eaten, for our own safety. After all, who really wants to eat a MessOnAPlate?

* Especially around Halloween time, there are many children’s cookbooks and family/parenting websites featuring recipes where delicious food is purposely styled to resemble something revolting or grotesque — hot dogs styled to look like severed toes, a gelatin dessert molded in the shape of a brain, shortbread cookies made to look like dismembered fingers, a chocolate dessert made to resemble dirt with worms in it (the worms are gummy worm candies), cookie or cracker snacks styled as spiders or bugs, a cake made to look like a pan of kitty litter, you get the idea.

* One episode of the ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'' anime in the ''Advanced Generation'' series is about this. The main characters come across two competing restaurants whose chefs are Pokémon, a Sneasel and a Mr. Mime. The Sneasel's food looks bland but tastes great, while the food cooked by Mr. Mime [[IntertedTrope is visually appealing but tastes terrible]].

* One episode of the ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'' anime in the ''Advanced Generation'' series is about this. The main characters come across two competing restaurants whose chefs are Pokémon, a Sneasel and a Mr. Mime. The Sneasel's food looks bland but tastes great, while the food cooked by Mr. Mime is visually appealing but tastes terrible.