Satisfy an inner need (3)
I believe the answer is:
eat
'need' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both related to consumption as well as being verbs in their base form.
Maybe there's an association between them I don't understand?
'satisfy an inner' is the wordplay.
'satisfy' becomes 'et' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'an' becomes 'a'.
'inner' is an insertion indicator.
'et' enclosing 'a' is 'EAT'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for eat that I've seen before include "Make food disappear" , "get stuck in" , "Ingest" , "put away" , "Devour" .)