George Calombaris smuggles 'white powder' into the I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! jungle

Controversial celebrity chef George Calombaris has revealed he smuggled 'white powder' onto the set of I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!

In a video posted to Instagram, the 47-year-old former MasterChef star said he could not live without seasoning for his food, so he snuck in salt and vinegar food flavouring.

George could be seen shovelling the concoction into a tiny plastic sachet in the clip while mocking the survival show's strict food rules.

The former hospitality entrepreneur had previously discussed flouting the show's regulations on an episode of The Kyle and Jackie O Show last month.

'This is the contraband that I took into the jungle,' George says in the black and white clip.

'Flavour, flavour, flavour.'

George filmed the short video ahead of his trip to South Africa.

The hospitality entrepreneur also took Japanese dashi and sake powder, as well as wasabi, stock cubes and instant miso into the jungle.

George, who entered the show as an intruder, disclosed his deception to the other contestants soon after entering camp.

He had previously revealed that he watched the crime show Breaking Bad for tips on how best to smuggle his food contraband onto set.

Fans appeared to applaud the foodie's audacity, with many sharing their enthusiasm for George's act of cunning on his post.

'So good while it lasted, brother,' fellow cast member Matt Zukowski said.

During his time on the show, George has shared the devastation of watching his career fall by the wayside as he faced a wage underpayment scandal at his restaurant group.

He explained that the phone just 'stopped ringing' and he turned to alcohol to cope during an episode of the survival series last month.

'It was the weirdest feeling, you've suddenly gone from your phone buzzing all day long, emails, MasterChef, restaurants, blah, blah, blah - to nothing,' he told his campmates.

'And I just went, "What do I do now?" The first couple of months were horrible,' he continued.

'I was binge drinking and then one day, my best man found me in a bush down the road, literally, and slapped it out of me. I'll never forget that moment.

'I just went, "Enough is enough. I'm gonna pull my head in".'

He told the group that he takes 'full responsibility' for what happened.

The one-time fan favourite saw his hospitality empire unravel in 2019 when his MAdE Establishment Group was ordered to repay $7.8 million in staff underpayments and fined $200,000 after more than 500 workers were affected.

The scandal ended his long-running role on MasterChef and turned him into one of the most divisive figures in the Australian food sector.

But George insists the label that followed him was harder to stomach than the financial hit.

'The most hurtful part of what I went through was being tagged a thief,' he told The Daily Telegraph, describing the accusation as deeply at odds with the values instilled in him by his parents.

While he maintains his life is 'in a really good place', the jungle offers something he has not had in years – a platform to confront the narrative head-on, away from courtrooms, boardrooms and restaurant closures.

'In a way, if you want to call it redemption, yeah a little bit of that,' he told The Daily Telegraph.