Recovered dry ale bottles (6)
I believe the answer is:
better
'recovered' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'dry ale bottles' is the wordplay.
'dry' becomes 'tt' (abbreviation for teetotal).
'ale' becomes 'beer' (I've seen this before**).
'bottles' indicates putting letters inside ('bottle' can mean to contain).
'tt' put inside 'beer' is 'BETTER'.
(Other definitions for better that I've seen before include "More able" , "M ore appropriate" , "More appropriate; gambler" , "layer" , "More competent - gambler" .)