Macerate a substance picked after first of apples, most of the time (2,5,2,3)
I believe the answer is:
as often as not
'apples most of the time' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't tell whether it can be defined by this definition.
'macerate a substance picked after first' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'a' is present in the answer.
'substance' could be 'snot' (snot is a kind of substance) and 'snot' is found within the answer.
'first' could be 'a' (first letter of the alphabet) and 'a' is found within the answer.
The remaining letters 'soften' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
'of' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for as often as not that I've seen before include "Quite frequently" , "At least half the time" , "in about half of the instances" , "50% of the time" .)