Kitchen king

Akshay Kumar is evidently enjoying his stint in the kitchen. The action hero, who will host the Star Plus show MasterChef Kitchen, is apparently so enamoured with his new avatar that wild horses can’t drag him away from the sets. And if hunger strikes in between shots, Akki simply dips into the kitchen stores and munches on some dry fruits. “Akshay is extremely fond of dry fruits. So he often opens the MasterChef kitchen and grabs a handful and munches on them throughout the day,” says a source. His nibble habits apart, did you know that Kumar has also helped compile a cookbook exclusively for the Bachchan family? And the showstealer among the recipes? The Khiladi special sizzler, of course.

Kerala calling

Malayalam actor Mohanlal has realised that he doesn’t know his home state Kerala so well after all. The realisation dawned on him at the Saatchi Gallery in London, where the actor was representing his state at the world premiere of an ad film on Kerala tourism. Celebrities like Mick Jagger’s daughter Jade Jagger and soccer star Didier Drogba were present at the launch of the three-minute film, titled Your Moment is Waiting. The film pitches God’s Own Country as a place that has a profound impact on travellers and depicts a tourist “drink in” the beauty of Kerala’s landscape. Mohanlal plans to do the same. “I have to go back to Kerala and discover it again,” he said. What was that adage about nearest to the church, farthest from God?

Act right

Sometimes that thing called acting prowess does help one get into Bollywood. Calcutta girl Anangsha Biswas has bagged a Bollywood film, riding not on modelling achievements or a starry lineage but simply on her acting cred. “I had no filmy contacts when I landed in Mumbai. So I thought I could hone my acting skills in theatre and then try Bollywood,” she says. Having worked with theatre legends like Naseeruddin Shah and Benjamin Gilani in the last three years, Biswas will now hit the silver screen with her debut film Benny and Babloo, starring Kay Kay Menon, Riya Sen, Rajpal Yadav and others. “I have worked hard for this role, and I hope people will appreciate me,” she says. Go girl, we say!

Sweat it

Trust Salman Khan to bat for a noble cause. eBay has roped in the bad boy with a famously good heart — Khan has his own charity called Being Human — for a charity auction to benefit The Research Society, an NGO that works with special children. The USP of the auction is that you can bid for a gym training session with Khan. The auction, which began on September 19 and runs till 5pm this evening, has already seen bids of up to Rs 4,14,123. Sometime between now and March 2011, Khan will train with the highest bidder and share tips on how to get that perfectly muscled torso he bares at the drop of a shirt. Interested? Then log on to www.ebay.in/jgw and get set to sweat it out with Salman Khan.

Sylvan soul

Remember Atul Kulkarni, who played the role of a young man with right-wing views in Rang De Basanti? Well, Kulkarni, who has since won accolades for his performance in the Marathi movie Natarang, has boldly gone where few showbiz denizens have been before. The actor has bought a 24-acre plot of land near Satara in Maharashtra and has begun turning it into a forest. “I wanted to give back to nature what we have stolen from it,” says Kulkarni. He has also made it a point not to plant a single yield crop on his land because he does not want to derive any profit from it. “All I want is that the next generation should enjoy the beauty of a dense, evergreen forest,” says Kulkarni. The earth would surely have been a greener place if there were a few more people like him.