You can always rely on your mum to bring you crashing back down to earth when your head is in the clouds, dreaming up big ideas.

That was certainly the case for TV chef, author and deli owner Stacie Stewart, who runs Eat Naked in The Lanes in Brighton with her partner Ryan Brown.

Sunderland-born Stacie, 36, said: “I knew I wanted to open a clean eating deli, but my mam said ‘Pet, no one will pay £3 for a slice of cake up here, when they can get four for a pound at Greggs’.

“She was right, so my boyfriend and business partner Ryan and I rocked up in Brighton three years ago in a battered old car and a little bit of money between us to start up our business.

“We wanted to offer something unpretentious, with a real focus on healthy eating while still being affordable for our customers.”

Stacie and Ryan had their eye on a unit in East Street Arcade straight away and could not believe their luck that it was just within budget.

She said: “It was at the top end of what we could afford, but we knew if we pulled our belts right in we could do it.

“We started it on a shoestring and literally hit the ground running.

“For the first couple of years we had to do it all ourselves to keep our overheads down, then we took someone on to help us last year. She’s class.”

Now Stacie and Ryan are ready to expand Eat Naked and are forming a collaboration with the Body Fuel Café in Church Road, Hove, which will see a fusion of both menus.

This means they have had to hire again to keep their original branch running efficiently.

Stacie said: “We’ve just taken on another person to be me in Brighton.

“We’ve totally landed on our feet there as our new girl has run similar cafes in London so we are in safe hands.”

As well as her obvious talent with food, Stacie’s passion and energy for life are clearly the secret to her many and varied successes.

She has ventured down several different career paths over the past few years, each one leading on to a new opportunity.

Reaching the finals on the BBC’s Masterchef in 2011, Stacie was propelled into a whole new world of exciting TV projects.

She made it to the last four in the series and said: “Off the back of MasterChef, I was in the kitchen on This Morning for a couple of years.

“I’ve also appeared on Tried And Tested with Michel Roux and ITV’s How to Lose Weight Well, which I’ve just released a book off the back of.

“It’s got all the best recipes from the series and has loads of advice in it for losing weight healthily.

“It’s sold 20,000 copies in a month, which is amazing and completely overwhelming at the same time.”

Stacie herself has her own weight loss success story, losing five stone having learned all there is to know about healthy eating from experts and nutritionists through her TV work.

While on the panel of How to Lose Weight Well, she and her fellow presenters tried an array of different diets from the sublime to the ridiculous.

Now she’s happy to pass on her pearls of wisdom to friends and customers alike as she has achieved so much herself.

“I know it sounds cheesy,” she said. “But before all this I was completely clueless myself and now I just love chatting to people who come in the deli, giving them advice on how to eat well.”

In a whirl of happy activity, preparing for the launch of their new venture in Hove, Stacie was hot-footing to the café to receive some exciting deliveries.

“We’ve got our new sign coming later and a massive plant to set the tone, which I was telling my mam about last night,” she said.

“She thought it was hilarious I’d spoken to a plant consultant about it as she’s used to grabbing a little pot plant off the shelf in B&Q.”

Eat Naked at Body Fuel Café, owned by Jason Tannenbaum, opens in Church Road, Hove on Monday with a full breakfast menu and plenty of options for lunch such as fresh salads and meats on offer.

When asked if she prefers being behind the counter in the deli, or in front of the television cameras, there’s no contest.

“Behind the counter, chatting to customers” she beamed.

“Corny as it is, if I can help one person with my healthy eating advice, I’m a happy girl.”