I have this fear of coming across as a Barbie doll who got lucky. Style is a big part of who I am, but it's not who I am. Ya know?

I used to watch my grandmother make fancy, Julia Child-style beef bourguignon. And growing up in New York City, I was exposed to many cultures. I experimented with Puerto Rican and Jamaican food.

Some people in LA are addicted. They have to be here. My personal life is stronger than my professional life, in terms of priorities.

My mother was really young when she had me, so she was a horrible cook, but we lived with my grandmother, who was fantastic. We eventually got our own place, and my mother started learning to cook. But it was also the '70s, so she was very experimental, and, well - thank God we had a dog.

In the family, in interpersonal relationships, even in friendship, faith is tremendously important. If you have a partner who you believe is a good person, then it is your duty to have faith in them until the end, despite the fact that they might have done some bad things. And you have to support and believe in your children.

If you put stimulus into an economy, you know there is a time lag in terms of depending where you invest it. If it's family transfers, it might be quick. If it's infrastructure, it might be two, three, five years.

I'm a proper Essex girl because my family was part of that great exodus from the East End.

I come from an orthodox Muslim family.