Becky Van Drunen has popped into the world of cookbooks with one that merges dual passions for food and music.
The Cloverdale-area entrepreneur created “Playlist Kitchen” as a pandemic project when other career pursuits hit a wall.
Van Drunen runs meal-prep business Basil and Bacon Foods out of a commercial kitchen, and as a trained musician works as Long & McQuade‘s national manager of music lessons.
Writing the 207-page cookbook “saved me during the pandemic and allowed me to pivot my business during these tough times,” she revealed.
“Playlist Kitchen” is filled with 81 pop music-inspired recipes with quirky titles, including “I Wanna Dance with Some Satay” (a nod to Whitney Houston), “If You Wanna Banh Mi My Lover” (a Vietnamese sandwich recipe dashed with Spice Girls) and “Hit Me Basil One More Time” (Thai Basil Chicken done Britney Spears style), along with ’90s-era playlists to cook to. Included are main dishes, appetizers, salads, soups and some “secret tracks.”
Van Drunen has good reason to be stoked about the self-published cookbook.
“It’s just nice to have a project completed during this tough time, beginning, middle and end,” she said.
“I’m a creative person and I get bored, but it was out of necessity too,” added Van Drunen, a mother of two girls. “It kind of came out of nowhere, but it’s a story everyone can relate to, just being in the slump of the pandemic and feeling lost.”
A video documenting the cookbook-creation process was shown during a virtual book launch in May, with highlights on Van Drunen’s Instagram account (@beckyvandrunen).
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On the cookbook cover, an introduction elaborates on Van Drunen’s project: “‘Playlist Kitchen’ is my music, it’s my food, it’s my memories, and it’s the soundtrack to my joy. So, go ahead, turn the page, turn on that music, and create the next volume of your joy — an upbeat cooking experience that will help you reconnect with the comfort of the kitchen and the magic of the music that brings memories to life.”
“Playlist Kitchen” is sold on beckyvandrunen.com and Amazon, and also at some local retailers.
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