No need for the fat suit as Jamie piles on the pounds

Only months ago he donned a fat suit to highlight the damage done by eating junk food. Now it seems Jamie Oliver no longer needs one.

The celebrity chef looked as though he had been ignoring his own advice and packing on the pounds for real at a fundraising event.

As he showed off his skills on the drums he also showed off a large double chin.

And his chef's whites seemed to be slightly tighter than normal.

One guest at the event at the Roundhouse in Camden, North London, said: "Jamie had definitely put some weight on.

"He was a lot slimmer a few months ago. He looked as though he'd been overindulging."

His wife Jools, who revealed she was going to try for a third baby, insisted that he ate healthy food but admitted he didn't exercise.

"I really want him to be more fit but he doesn't have time," she said.

Oliver, 31, has been at the forefront of a campaign to improve the healthiness of dinners served up to schoolchildren after being horrified at the junk food on offer.

His impassioned pleas to the Government led to ministers pledging to improve youngsters' eating habits.

The chef warned that the nation's children were becoming "overweight underachievers".

In an ad for his show - Return To Jamie's School Dinners - he was cocooned in a latex fat suit and was filmed waddling along clutching a load of burgers in his sausage like fingers. He was also filmed breaking a scooter by sitting on it.

Luckily for guests at the event on Thursday night - which was in aid of his Fifteen Foundation and Great Ormond Street Hospital - the food on offer was slightly more appetising.

They were served Bay potted crab with winter leaf salad and bread followed by sirloin steak in parma ham and roasted new potatoes. Desert was chilled rice pudding with poached quince and cranberry syrup.

Each table of 10 had paid £5,000 to be there and auction prizes included a holiday to Montego Bay and a chance to appear as a guest on the Oprah Winfrey show.

He and Jools, also 31, danced as pop singer Lemar played before the chef got up to join him on the stage.

Earlier he admitted he was nervous as he was out of practice.

At the end of the event, which raised £370,000, Oliver and actor Kevin Spacey got behind the bar to pour cocktails for other guests.

Oliver's spokesman said: "The photographers were taking pictures below him so it was just a mixture of an unfortunate camera angle and a trick of the light."