MasterChef The Professionals festive winner says victory gave her ‘closure’

MasterChef The Professionals: A Festive Knockout winner Louisa Ellis has said winning the competition has given her “closure”.

The chef was a finalist on MasterChef: The Professionals in 2017 but fell short of claiming the top prize.

After being crowned as the winner of Tuesday’s festive episode, Ellis said appearing on the programme has given her a confidence boost.

“It means a lot to me to have been able to win, just because I felt like because I hadn’t won the first time I felt like I had so much more to prove,” she told the PA news agency.

“But not just that, it’s a bit of closure for myself.

“I feel like I have finally got to the point in my career where I can finally just step back a bit and just try and enjoy my work a bit more rather than just stress out and panic about things.

“I feel like now I have finally got to the stage where I have put myself through so much stress and finally it’s just a complete relief and yeah, as soon as I’d won it I was just like, ‘Wow, I can take a step back and now I can focus on other things rather than trying to prove what I can do’.”

Ellis saw off competition from other former contestants including Danny Parker from the 2014 series, 2009’s Marianne Lumb and 2018 semi-finalist William Chilila.

They were tasked with making festive canapes and a season two-course meal, in addition to completing a skills test.

Ellis said that appearing on the programme has given her “so much confidence”.

“I’m so glad I did it and I wouldn’t be where I am today without it, I wouldn’t have thought,” she said.

Ellis said returning to the programme for the second time was more nerve-racking than it was first time round.

“I felt I had so much more to lose just because there was a three-year gap since I was last on and I feel like I did quite well the first time round, so I almost thought what was the point in going back on a second time,” she said.

“But actually I felt that I have learnt quite a lot in those three years and I really wanted to show the judges what I had learnt.”