Try cooking meat to provide tasty starters (7)
I believe the answer is:
attempt
'try' is the definition.
('attempt' can be a synonym of 'try')
'cooking meat to provide tasty starters' is the wordplay.
'cooking' indicates anagramming the letters.
'starters' says to take the initial letters.
The first letters of 'to provide tasty' is 'tpt'.
'meat'+'tpt'='meattpt'
'meattpt' with letters rearranged gives 'ATTEMPT'.
(Other definitions for attempt that I've seen before include "Effort; go" , "bid to kill someone" , "Have a crack" , "Essay" , "Stab" .)