Professor Green has been working on new material during lockdown.

The 36-year-old rapper - who released his most recent full length album 'Growing Up In Public' - dropped new EP 'M.O.T.H' in September last year, and he's been using the last few months "wisely" by spending time in his home studio.

He exclusively told BANG Showbiz: "I've been in the studio loads. It's nice, because I've got a studio in my back garden so I don't have to travel too far for work.

"I can work as and when. It's really nice at the moment, because I've realised I never needed to leave the house for all the meetings about the meetings we're gonna have.

"It's really nice to not have to do that. I've got more time at home. It's making me feel more at home here, it's making it more homely."

The star - whose real name is Stephen Manderson - explained how even getting more interested in cooking has benefited his creativity when it comes to dealing with writer's block.

He added: "I'm not living the life of takeaways, I can just leave the studio for an hour and cook some food - which is actually a really nice gap between banging my head against a brick wall because I can't think of the next line.

"I come out, I'm in the kitchen, something's on the stove and then the idea comes into my head.

"I just have to be careful when I run back into the studio and leave the food on the stove and burn it."

Unfortunately, the coronavirus pandemic has forced Pro Green - who has taken part in the new DNA Dishes campaign by Living DNA and Gousto - to push back his touring plans, with dates originally set for May this year initially delayed until November and then March next year, but even that is too soon.

He said: "I have been using my time pretty wisely, and I'm in the studio a lot. Everything up until now has sort of been, right, the album's coming out here so it has to be finished by this date.

"A bit of pressure is good because it means you get things done, but then it was always, OK, let's plan a release around a tour, or a tour around a release. I can't plan a tour."

He's only performed live once this year in a live streamed Zoom gig to 1,700 fans, which was a reminder of the power of music.

He smiled: "That gave me a bit of a lift. I didn't realise - it sounds silly because I know it matters to me, it's something I love doing.

"But that gap in having not performed and then doing that really, really put a smile on my face, and it did give me a lift."

Curious cooks can sign up for a free at-home DNA Dishes kit at https://dnadishes.com.