Cheerful and not daft, consuming a half of stout (8)
I believe the answer is:
sanguine
'cheerful' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'not daft consuming a half of stout' is the wordplay.
'not daft' becomes 'sane' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'consuming' indicates putting letters inside.
'a half of' suggests halving the letters.
'stout' becomes 'guinness' (Guinness is an example).
'guinness' with half the letters taken is 'guin'.
'sane' enclosing 'guin' is 'SANGUINE'.
'and' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for sanguine that I've seen before include "Hopeful of winning - or ruddy" , "Cheerfully optimistic" , "Expecting good results" , "Assured, optimistic" , "Hopeful or optimistic" .)