Serves drinks cold after energy returns (6)
I believe the answer is:
elects
'returns' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both to do with social activities as well as being verbs in their -s form.
Maybe you can see an association between them that I can't see?
'serves drinks cold after energy' is the wordplay.
'serves' becomes 'lets' (let is a kind of serve).
'drinks' is an insertion indicator (inserted letters are consumed or drunk).
'cold' becomes 'C' (eg on taps).
'after' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'energy' becomes 'e' (physics symbol as in E=mce).
'lets' going around 'c' is 'lects'.
'lects' put after 'e' is 'ELECTS'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for elects that I've seen before include "Chooses by vote" , "Appoints through voting system" , "Appoints via he ballot box" , "Selects by a vote" , "Appoints to office through ballot" .)