Chew a cat's item, oddly (9)
I believe the answer is:
masticate
'chew' is the definition.
(I know that chew can be written as masticate)
'a cat's item oddly' is the wordplay.
'oddly' indicates an anagram (letters in an odd order).
'a'+'cats'+'item'='acatsitem'
'acatsitem' with letters rearranged gives 'MASTICATE'.
(Other definitions for masticate that I've seen before include "Chomp" , "Crush" , "deal with mouthful" , "Process food" , "champ" .)