Use of と見える in this sentence

Question

I understand that と見える can come after a noun, a verb and an i-adjective and means 'seems'. Could you please provide some simple examples of how to use this construct with a noun? I can't think of an example where this would be meaningful.

For i-adjectives does the following examples have different meaning/nuance おいしいと見える and おいしそうだ

Also, I can't figure out how it works in this quote:

私には本物の若殿様がわかります。

若様は手習いのあとと見えて、手に墨がついております。」

I know who the real young lord is. It seems it is after the young lord's writing practice and his hands are stained with ink.

In this case と見える doesn't come after noun, verb or adjective and my translation sounds very clumsy. Thanks.

Answer 1

と can be used with either a sentence or a noun.

with 思う
彼は正しいと思う (with sentence, "[I] think he is right")
これを形見と思う (with noun, "[I] think of it as a keepsake")

with 見られる
地震が原因で倒壊したとみられる (with sentence, "[It] collapsed probably due to the earthquake")
地震が原因と見られる (with noun, "the earthquake is probably the cause")

～と見える means "it seems that...". However, it is considered very formal or old.

先生はお忙しいと見える (with sentence, "The professor seems to be busy.")
先生は多忙と見える (with noun, same meaning)

Some more... 彼はなかなかの秀才と見え、あの問題を一瞬で解いてしまった (he seems very talented, and solved that problem in an instant.) やつはなかなかの堅物と見える (that guy seems too serious)

Your example

おいしいと見える

is correct but very unnatural, because it combines informal/conversational (おいしい) and formal/historic (～と見える) words. (By the way, おいしいと見える is sentence+～と見える、with the sentence's subject etc. are let out).

That said, the difference between ～そうだ and ～と見える in

先生はお忙しそうだ
先生は多忙と見える

is that, as I already said, the latter is much more formal (but not 敬語. The polite version is 先生はご多忙とお見受けする)

若様は手習いのあとと見えて
It seems it is after the young lord's writing practice,

The meaning of あと is "after," but grammatically it is a noun in Japanese.

Answer 2

Here it means simply "to see", but I think it means more appears than that and more than "seems". I think the idea is that what is seen is clear and apparent. For example:

竜巻のあとと見えて、風速がEF5のしきいを超えたことをすぐに理解できる。

Upon seeing the ruins/remains/trace of the tornado, it's easy to understand the wind speeds were in the realm of an EF5.

Though that's just my opinion.

Answer 3

美味しいと見える does not work as grammar. If Japanese people say it, it means the same as おいしそうだ.