MasterChef contestant Chris Badenoch has been branded a cheat — both in life and on television — by his former girlfriend.
While the contestants were quarantined in a house in Sydney and banned from seeking outside help, Badenoch has been accused of texting ex-girlfriend Gemma Pritchard and asking her to source difficult-to-prepare ingredients.
A Current Affair discovered Ms Pritchard — who would turn out to be one of three women Badenoch was seeing at the time — offered to help him win a $100,000 prize.
The incident involved a challenge to cook dinner for VIP guests with $100 worth of ingredients, 15 minutes to spend in a Coles supermarket and an hour to cook the dish.
Badenoch allegedly texted Ms Pritchard and requested that she ring ahead to Coles to order calves liver and marrow bones cut into twelve pieces: an order that would usually take an hour to prepare and be impossible to get in the timeframe allowed by the show.
"I feel guilty ever since I did that (ordered the meat) and I didn't really think about the ramifications for the other contestants at the time," she said.
"It was a pretty heady time."
She said she did not think about the consequences of helping her former boyfriend cheat, saying "I know it sounds stupid now but no".
ACA also heard claims from a former landlord that Badenoch owes up to $15,000 in back rent.
Badenoch has denied all the allegations.
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