Taste a delicate starter of pâté beforehand (8)
I believe the answer is:
appetite
'taste' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'a delicate starter of pate beforehand' is the wordplay.
'delicate' becomes 'petite' (petite can mean small and delicate).
'starter of' indicates taking the first letters.
'beforehand' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
The first letter of 'pate' is 'p'.
'petite' after 'p' is 'ppetite'.
'a'+'ppetite'='APPETITE'
(Other definitions for appetite that I've seen before include "Physical need for food" , "Natural craving" , "demand" , "'Strong desire, craving (8)'" , "A feeling of craving something" .)