Loosen pants having consumed 500 items from a Chinese takeaway (7)
I believe the answer is:
noodles
'items from a chinese takeaway' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are plural nouns, I don't understand how they can define each other.
'loosen pants having consumed 500' is the wordplay.
'pants' indicates anagramming the letters (UK informal term for 'nonsense' or 'rubbish').
'having consumed' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'500' becomes 'D' (Roman numeral for 500).
'loosen' anagrammed gives 'nooles'.
'nooles' placed around 'd' is 'NOODLES'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for noodles that I've seen before include "Simpletons (colloq.)" , "Oriental pasta" , "Strips of pasta for soup" , "idiots!" , "Egg pasta; simpletons" .)