Crossword Genius

Sales pitch given by vacuous shill holding baked product (5)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

spiel

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'sales pitch' is the definition.
(spiel can mean a sales pitch or presentation)

'vacuous shill holding baked product' is the wordplay.
'vacuous' says to hollow out the word (remove centre letters).
'holding' indicates putting letters inside.
'baked product' becomes 'pie' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'shill' with its middle removed is 'sl'.
'sl' enclosing 'pie' is 'SPIEL'.

'given by' is the link.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for spiel that I've seen before include "Piles (anag.)" , "Glib style of talk associated with salesmen" , "Glib story" , "Salesperson's speech" , "Salesman's glib patter" .)

I've seen this clue in The Irish Times.
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