Wine region, note, preserving essence of vin ordinaire? (8)
I believe the answer is:
mediocre
'ordinaire?' is the definition.
Both the answer and definition are adjectives.
Perhaps you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'wine region note preserving essence of vin' is the wordplay.
'wine region' becomes 'Medoc' (Medoc is a French wine region).
'note' becomes 're' (as in do-re-mi).
'preserving' is an insertion indicator.
'essence of' indicates the central letters.
The middle of 'vin' is 'i'.
'medoc'+'re'='medocre'
'medocre' going around 'i' is 'MEDIOCRE'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for mediocre that I've seen before include "Pedestrian, second-rate" , "Rather inferior" , "poor to middling" , "Moderate to inferior in quality" , "Of only average quality" .)