Enquire about a non-starter said to be in the soup (5)
I believe the answer is:
snoop
'said to be in the soup' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'enquire about a non-starter' is the wordplay.
'enquire' becomes 'soop' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'about' is an insertion indicator.
'starter' indicates taking the first letters.
The first letter of 'non' is 'n'.
'soop' placed around 'n' is 'SNOOP'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for snoop that I've seen before include "-- Dogg, US rapper; spy" , "Be nosy" , "Informally, pry inquisitively" , "Stick one's nose in" , "Furtively look around" .)