Cooking roots -- it makes a dish (7)
I believe the answer is:
risotto
'a dish' is the definition.
(risotto is a kind of dish)
'cooking roots it' is the wordplay.
'cooking' indicates anagramming the letters.
'roots'+'it'='rootsit'
'rootsit' is an anagram of 'RISOTTO'.
'makes' acts as a link.
(Other definitions for risotto that I've seen before include "Italian course" , "It has roots in Italian rice-based dish" , "scoff" , "Italian food" , "Perhaps Italian" .)