Daisy Green Food: This London restaurant chain loved by celebs has just grabbed £3.4m funding

Millennial dining favourite The Daisy Green Collection, a London restaurant chain with celebrity fans including singer Ellie Goulding and the Vamps' James McVey, has won a £3.4m debt investment to almost double its size.The Australia-inspired chain, which operates out of eight sites including two barges, aims to use the investment from challenger bank OakNorth to expand to 14 sites by 2020.Founded in 2012 by two former City bankers, Prue Freeman and her husband Tom Onions, Daisy Green began life as a Ford transit van below the Gherkin selling coffee and smoothies.Read more: Revealed: Notes coffee shop nets £600,000 loan from challenger bank OakNorth to open two new London branches, despite Brexit uncertaintyThe business now spans London from Liverpool Street to Southwark, and its next project will be opening a 4,000 square foot space in Soho."The Daisy Green Collection is an extremely strong, invested business - despite being incredibly young it is already EBITDA [earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation] positive across all its mature sites, no doubt down to the commitment and passion of its founders," said OakNorth's Ben Barbanel and Deepesh Thakrar in a statement.Freeman, a former UBS investment banker, and Onions, who has held positions at UBS, Santander and Citi, aimed to create a chain which brought the flavours of Australasia to London.Read more: Seed capital comes to London start up that helps street food traders set up shopThe business has been recognised by Vogue as a "leading" vegetarian and vegan restaurant, serving dishes from bacon rolls with paratha roti to roasted aubergine with crispy rice and miso tahini sauce.OakNorth now has a loan book of more than £900m, and plans to lend a further £1.5bn next year.Read more: Challenger bank OakNorth completes its largest-ever deal with £21m loan to fund a luxury London hotel