Peel fruit, by the sound of it (4)
I believe the answer is:
pare
'peel' is the definition.
(I know that peel can be written as pare)
'fruit by the sound of it' is the wordplay.
'fruit' becomes 'pear' (pear is a kind of fruit).
'by the sound of it' indicates a 'sounds like' (homophone) clue.
'pear' is a homophone of 'PARE'.
(Other definitions for pare that I've seen before include "Trim by slicing" , "Trim off in layers" , "Remove the skin from" , "Shave or peel" , "Decrease gradually" .)