Pinch of salt roughly put in pies the wrong way (8)
I believe the answer is:
abstract
'pinch' is the definition.
(synonyms)
'salt roughly put in pies the wrong way' is the wordplay.
'salt' becomes 'ab' (able seaman - 'salt' can mean a sailor).
'roughly' becomes 'c' (circa).
'put in' is an insertion indicator.
'pies' becomes 'tarts' (I've seen this before).
'the wrong way' says the letters should be written backwards.
'c' placed into 'tarts' is 'tcarts'.
'tcarts' in reverse letter order is 'stract'.
'ab'+'stract'='ABSTRACT'
'of' is the link.
(Other definitions for abstract that I've seen before include "Theoretical; painting" , "Summary; remove" , "Half-inch" , "Theoretical, not concrete" , "Intangible" .)