Nina Wadia

Of course she doesn’t really cook the food in the soap because most is brought onto the set ready-prepared, but Nina enjoys cooking at home and chose to cook a dish that reminds her of the flavours of her birthplace in Mumbai, India, where she grew up in a ground-floor flat that regularly flooded during the monsoon season.

Akoori is a scrambled egg dish that fuses Indian and British tastes, so it’s spicy without being too fierce – unlike some of the dishes Nina’s fellow actors have to endure working on EastEnders. She told Simon that she spices up her on-screen husband by sneaking more chilli than reasonable into the meals he has to eat on set!

This recipe is a family favourite eaten by her grandfather every day at tea-time, and Nina's dad, who worked for an airline, loved to eat it when he came home from work. “He’d come home and say, 'Where’s my Akoori?' to my mum and she would make up this egg dish up. It’s real comfort food and it’s fabulous.” Nina now makes it for her husband, too.

Watch Nina cook this or why not have a go at cooking Akoori yourself!