A COMMUNITY has created a food-inspired social media page in a bid to bring its people together.

The Shad Chefs - The Council Estate Food Connoisseurs, was set up by a group of friends from Shadsworth at the end of 2018 and now has more than 2,000 members.

The Facebook page encourages those who live in Shadsworth and other areas of Blackburn to post pictures of their culinary creations and share nostalgic concoctions.

These can range from traditional full English breakfasts, roast dinners, takeaways, to more unusual meals including Pot Noodle poured over chips or garlic bread stuffed with sausage meatballs, pulled pork and onions topped with cheese.

The page’s main moderator, known as Head Chef Shanks who likes to keep his identity under wraps, said the page started out with a group of people from Shadsworth posting pictures of their tea on social media for a laugh.

He said: “People got into it and started telling us we should create a page, so here we are.

“We encourage people from all over to send us their meals and we post them.

“We have even had people from America sending us them.

“We might be called Shad Chefs, but you could say we cater for everybody.

“It’s quite surprising, really, how food can bring people together like it has.”

Since building up its following, the group now wants to support Shadsworth and other local areas.

Following a Lancashire Telegraph report on Leyton Wright, six, who was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy as a baby, the group started raising money for his family by selling raffle prizes donated by businesses.

The group has also created Shad Chefs cups and fridge magnets, made by Shadsworth-based Pretty Little Things, for people to win in raffles.

Head chef Shanks said: “We feel that this page is bringing Shadsworth together and showing us ‘Shadworthians’ in a good light instead of the usual negative press we get. People always seem to focus on the negatives, when in reality, Shadsworth is a good place to live.

“If we see anything positive about Shadsworth it gets posted on our page.

“The same goes for any Shadsworth-based events or if anybody wants to advertise their business.

“We’ve got the biggest Shadsworth-based page on Facebook at the minute, so if we can do some good with it, we will.”