Initially not much around to chew (5)
I believe the answer is:
munch
'chew' is the definition.
(munching is a kind of chewing)
'initially not much around' is the wordplay.
'initially' says to take the initial letters.
'around' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
The initial letter of 'not' is 'n'.
'n' put into 'much' is 'MUNCH'.
'to' is the link.
(Other definitions for munch that I've seen before include "who's popular in the gallery?" , "He depicted" , "Eat noisily" , "Edvard -, Norwegian artist (The Scream)" , "Painter of The Scream, d. 1944" .)