Commanding officer consumed rice cooked for Tully, the orator (6)
I believe the answer is:
cicero
'the orator' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'commanding officer consumed rice cooked for tully' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
an anagram of 'rice' is 'icer' which is present in the answer.
'officer' could be 'co' (Commanding Officer abbreviation) and 'co' is found in the leftover letters.
This accounts for all the letters.
This may be the basis of clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for cicero that I've seen before include "Philosopher" , "Roman stylist, orator" , "Old politician" , "One-time consul" , "Roman orator and master of prose" .)