Really cheap really filling snacks

[Waoop]

If you had to provide snacks in a rented home for 4 days for 30 people and wanted them to be really inexpensive what would you choose?

Context: family rental for 4 days in October the cost covered by the invitees.

We have been allocated snacks for 4 days as our contribution and we are trying to disguise that we have a very very small budget. Financially we are really struggling. The exact brief was a 'snack basket for each room'

There are three main meals a day, but from seeing what people are planning for these some are really light. Yogurt and fruits for breakfast and sandwiches for lunch. We are in charge of the snacks so expect people maybe hungry.

Looking for really cheap and filling snacks. We have more time than money so we can shop from multiple stores.

What sort of budget should we set aside and what would you recommend?

1. are you near a Costco ?
2. do you have a card or do you have a friend with a Costco card ? because they do trays of delicious cookies , beignets , brownies , muffins , boxes of crisps etc( you mentioned these don’t need to be healthy snacks? ) these will work out less time consuming and less expensive than baking your own cookies etc .

@Leavelingeringbreathtbf I posted before OP said that & in response to saying that everyone there eats healthily!!
I didn’t think crisps/ chocolate fit the bill.

OP has since said she has £100 to spend so she’ll be fine!

I’ve always just boughtt cheapest own brand porridge oats and was taught the 2,4,6,8 BeRo recipe so that’s my go to.

2 (30g) tablespoons golden syrup
4 oz (115g) butter/marge
6 oz (175g) light brown soft sugar
8 oz (225g) oats

that makes 16 portions.

Asda

Golden syrup £1.72 - 750g - (5 servings)
Marge £2.80 - 1kg (8 servings)
sugar £1.90 - 500g (2 servings)
oats - £0.85 - 1kg (4 servings)

so if you buy 2 bags of sugar or a bigger bag from somewhere else because Asda doesn’t do them you could make 4 batches for £9.17 which is 64 flapjacks at £0.14p each.

Thanks for doing that. I will give it a go.

You've got 4 - 5 months to spread the cost out so look for offers each month on the things you want to buy. Or could one of you work an extra shift /deliver leaflets or something to make a bit of extra money to cover buying snacks?

TBF £100 for snacks will not go very far for 30 people , 20 small bags of crisps are currently more than a fiver.
As for crisps and chocolate not being included because they are not healthy, really healthy diets do not include snacks beyond sticks of veg and fruit.
I don't think the gathering would be satisfied with that.
If you want to be healthier you could do popcorn in a few different flavours, veg stick and hummus, you could ald also do cold meat and cheese and some nice bread- but I think a few crisps or kettle chips as well wouldn't hurt.
Healthy filling stuff for 30 is really a meal, not snacks.

scones - cheese and chive, chorizo and cheese, sultana, pesto - you use very little flavouring and loads of flour! Make with Stork too but serve with butter.
flapjacks
cheese and crackers.
multipack biscuits

Lidl packs of 8 pain au chocolat - the ones that are individually wrapped
Homemade flapjacks
family packs of biscuits
multipack crisps - check what’s on offer

Oven roasted chickpeas. You can get cheap tins of ready cooked ones. Lots of recipes online.

Portion up into sandwich bags which can be sealed.

£100 / 30 * 4 is 83p per person per day. :-s

Realistically that’s an apple or banana and maybe half a packet of cookies (assuming £1 a packet).

Fruits , cereal bars , chocolates , cheese , crackers . Maybe it’s easier if you tell us your budget op and I can actually name some stuff instead if generalising

How many rooms? If only 4 or 5 per room obviously much easier than 2 per room. How many of the 30 are children?
Why are the breakfast people just doing yoghurt and fruit if most people eat unhealthily?!

• Cheese scones easy to make and filling. If you have some empty gu pudding pots you could fill with butter for each room.

• Flapjacks also easy and cheap if you get own brand oats.

• Cheese straws also easy and cheap to make.

• Lidl 'Pringles' and 'Ritz' crackers are cheap and really nice, I'd put a pack of each in each room.

• 1 sharer pack of chewy and 1 of chocolatey sweets per room and 1 pack of biscuits. If only 2 per room I probably buy sweets in bulk and make simple sweet cones, 1 per person.

in the lead up to add an item or two to each weekly shop, this will help balance out a bigger spend.
pick up baskets again one every couple of weeks so that’s not a spend at the time.

bag of sweets
bag or two of crisps
pain au chocolates/crepes/brioche rolls
flapjacks
Then last minute - some fruit to bulk it out

Thats what I go with anyway

Definitely make your own popcorn and buy some cellophane bags and ribbon to make it look posh. You can buy a bag of kernels for less than £2 and it makes absolutely loads. Use your biggest pan, spoonful of oil, cover base with kernels, lid on, cook until popping stops. Then mix in either icing sugar or salt. I'd do a bag of sweet and bag of savoury for each room. You probably need to do a few batches but it's quick.

Conversely I would think I had died and gone to heaven! One thing that does occur - is no one leaving this house? 3 meals a day and snacks, what else is happening apart from eating!

Make a selection of different cakes cheap & easy to do xx

She said it’s £100.

Bananas, small oranges, homemade flapjacks, biscuits and mini bags of popcorn

Two fish (or maybe three) and five loaves seems to satisfy quite a number of people.

I agree with homemade popcorn. You. An make fancy flavours too, like rosemary, or spiced popcorn... lots of recipes online (but if you're making ahead, don't do anything with moisture as this will affect the popcorn).

Homemade marshmallow crispy squares.

Flapjacks.

Carrot cake traybake without icing. It stays moist, and most carrot cake recipes use sunflower oil rather than butter, so they're a bit cheaper to make.

Homemade jam tarts https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/pauls_mums_jam_tarts_68845

Make a load of popcorn

Lovely idea 💡. I agree homemade stuff (tray bake/shortbread etc) looks really thoughtful and much cheaper than shop bought. I personally wouldn't want to pop my own popcorn for a snack.

That site looks fab for snacks....my kids never check BB dates on dry stuff but do with fridge snacks.

I'd go with:

Homemade popcorn is a good one as per some previous suggestions.
Bananas/satsumas/whatever fruit is in Aldi's super six that week type of thing. - if you say people are pretty healthy then I would spend £30 on fruit at least.
I know you've said people are healthy but I would still buy a good quantity of biscuits. 300g bourbons are £0.64. Most people might not want them but if even 1 in 5 do then it's still worth buying them as they're a bargain snack. Looking at the various inexpensive biscuits Asda sells you could get 1.8kg for £3.40.
Same on crisps - 24 packs of Asda crisps for £3.40. even if most people won't eat them, it's less than one bag per person, or buy 2 lots.

Then buy a few loaves of bread, couple of jars of marmite/jam and some butter and let people make toast.

If the alternative is making a single meal, see if you can swap as you could do one meal for 30 less expensively than making snacks for 4 days for 30 people I think.

“Snack basket for each room” to me sounds like something you’d get in a hotel room or Airbnb. This doesn’t sound like something too elaborate.
in a general snack basket I’d expect perhaps a couple bags of crisps, couple bars of chocolate or cookies, couple pieces of fruit. That’s about it.