The French, very into food and improving the mind (9)
I believe the answer is:
elevating
'improving the mind' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both related to change as well as being present participle verbs.
Maybe you can see a link between them that I can't see?
'the french very into food' is the wordplay.
'the french' becomes 'le' ('the' in French).
'very' becomes 'v' (abbreviation).
'into' indicates putting letters inside.
'food' becomes 'eating' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'le'+'v'='lev'
'lev' going inside 'eating' is 'ELEVATING'.
'and' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for elevating that I've seen before include "increasing" , "Lifting" , "Promoting" , "Giving a lift" .)