Padma Lakshmi talks about food, fashion, films. Pictures by Pradip Sanyal and Amit Datta

She is ?far more opinionated? than her doting husband, and so gets to decide the order in a restaurant, for both.

He is ?allowed to decide? upon his books, and so gets to draw just the inspiration he needs from his muse.

So, what?s cooking? A lot, in Shalimar the Clown, that is.

Salman Rushdie?s forthcoming novel has ?a lot of cooking?, the writer revealed on Thursday afternoon, dropping in after wife Padma Lakshmi?s chat session with Ladies Study Group members at The Park.

Cooking, of course, is one of Padma Lakshmi?s passions.

Cooking, modelling, writing and acting are her many facets, and she held nothing back in the hour-long talk show.

Cool in a black outfit, blue stole and knee-length brown stiletto boots, Lakshmi went from her childhood to fashion, food, feminism and films.

She got a break in modelling because she was not in the US, but pursuing her final thesis in Spain as an under-graduate drama exchange student, and for her ?exotic? Indian connection, recounted Lakshmi. That was then. ?Now, there are a whole lot of Indian models on the ramp. It?s great.?

The Delhi-born New Yorker is a self-confessed make-up maniac. ?My make-up kit is as varied as any professional artiste?s. I love colours. When I was two, I once took what I thought was kajal from my mother?s table and put it on my eyes, only to realise it was Vicks gel,? laughed the leggy lady.

The Indian woman has changed with the times. ?Twenty years ago, her make-up kit would contain a talc, a red lipstick and an eye pencil that had to be burnt to melt and use.?

Lakshmi?s aim is to create a line of make-up just for Indian women, like friend Iman (wife of singer David Bowie) did for African-American women.

The woman whose middle name is Parvati, but who took Lakshmi because her mother is Vijaylakshmi, is busy with the screenplay for Norma Klein?s Domestic Arrangements, under the banner of her own production company, Lakshmi Films. She is also preparing to play the protagonist in the screen adaptation of Rushdie?s short story The Firebird?s Nest.

Till Friday, she?ll be happy sharing the spotlight on the celebrity couple?s first trip to Calcutta.