What's your favorite budget "little treat"?

Popcorn with garlic powder, Parmesan, and black pepper.

35¢ of ingredients for a gourmet-feeling snack.

Oooh great shout! Now remembering how crazy we would go with the little $20 popcorn machine my mom bought.
And does it just stick? If so what's the trick? I pop my popcorn, and it must be some crazy salt resistant mutation. I have ground the salt up in a blender, bought the popcorn salt, etc and it's like the popcorn has some defense mechanism.
- I mean a small amount of oil usually helps.
- Tried Flavacol?
- You're not using enough oil when you pop, or you're not seeing it soon enough after removing it from the heat.

Not sure if this counts as "little" because it has to go into the oven for 45mins... But it's assembled in under 5 minutes and you can get rid of your old bananas that already turned brown:

Banana bread

4 Bananas, 80ml (vegetable) oil, 80g sugar, 250g flour, 2tsp baking powder, 1tsp vanilla sugar, some chocolate (drops).

Smash the bananas, mix in all the other ingredients to a smooth dough. Find some chocolate from christmas that's still laying around in the house, crush it and mix it in.

Bake it at 170°C. Takes 40-50min in a loaf pan. Don't forget to grase the pan before or use baking parchment.

Doesn't need any fancy ingredients like milk or eggs. And you can pretty much wing it. You can also experiment, put some cinnamon or oat flakes in... And don't bake it too well, I think it's best when it's still a bit gooey and moist inside.

just a straight up orange. I fucking love oranges

Huge orange fan also. Incredible fruit. Nom nom nom nom nom.
When i have water to clean up after myself, i just eat it like an apple, fuck eating every slice individually lol
- unhinged but i get it

Banana milk! 1 ripe banana, 1/2 cup milk, 1/2 cup water, 1 tbsp maple syrup, a few drops of vanilla extract, blend and pour through a sieve over ice. So refreshing and very cheap.

My banana bro!

Vegan chocolate chip cookie. I'm not vegan, but cutting dairy completely was a major daily health improvement. Tried it once for a few weeks and never went back.

Oh sick!
I always find joy in the fact that vegan community accidentally made a large infrastructure for people who need to cut out certain animal products.
Find that you can't eat eggs? Vegans know what replacements work for what purpose.
Milk disagree with you? They have choices!
Happy to hear that it made it easier to cut out dairy for your health!

Hint of Lime Tostitos and guacamole. I could eat an entire bag, which is why I rarely buy them.

Where can you get cheap guacamole?

Marshmallow Creme

Heck yeah

Cheap popsicles. Relatively low calories (<100 depending on the brand), take a while to eat, and are extremely cheap.

If you make your own you can drive the price and Calories even lower and drive the flavor way up.

Side note: I just learned "popsicle" is the brand name and not a term for the food. Kind of like saying Kleenex instead of tissue. I had no idea, I've just always called them popsicles.

The British were right with their Ice Lollies!
The skinny chocolate fudge pops usually hit the spot for me.
Hah crazy how often brands pull this off and we don't even notice.
But yeah popsicles are good! I now have good memories of making popsicles with like lemonade and strawberries in them in ice cube trays.
I should make some ice cube popsicles...
I've been enjoying these Skyr frozen yogurt pops that have only 90 calories and 7g of sugar but they're still about a dollar each which I feel is a little expensive.
- Definitely make your own, if you can stomach the time. You can buy molds online for a cheap initial investment, then just water down some fruit juice.
  You can also use real fruit if you don't mind a chunkier texture and own a food processor already.

Brown soda bread made with buttermilk, still warm from the oven with butter and good cheddar. So comforting. It's like tasting my childhood again.

You can't just lay that out there without giving us the deets on how to create it ourselves
- Here you go. :) Let me know if you give it a whirl!
- Hahaha. In a short space I've had two folks asking for it.
  It honestly couldn't be simpler. I did reply to the other request with the basics and will get back to you both in the morning as it's 2am here. :)
Do you have a recipe?
- I'm gonna get you the proper measurements etc. tomorrow because it's very late here but the ingredients are:
  400g wholemeal flour
  White plain flour, seived (my own preference is about 1/4 but you let your mouth decide from experience)
  Baking soda
  Pinch of salt
  Buttermilk until it's fairly mushy
  Honestly you just lump it all together. Make a circular mound out of it. Criss cross with a knife and lob it in the oven on a floured baking tray at 180C for fan.
  I'll get you a proper recipe in the morning or poke me if I forget. It's hard to do wrong and I'm not a good baker.

DIET COKE

Which is probably even more unhealthy than regular coke since it uses the same or more amount of sugar but artificial sugar.
- That may be the dumbest thing I've ever seen on this website.

This is a weird one, but hear me out. Undiluted cold brew coffee mixed with chocolate meal replacement powder and milk. The powder and milk make it really foamy when mixed and it tastes so good; it would probably also be amazing blended with ice.

I don't tend to eat until later in the day so this has the added benefit of making me feel less guilty for forgetting to eat.

Also, frozen pudding cups are yummy.

"Hear me out"
describes a lazy chocolate coffee
I mean it is a unique way of making it, but it's still just adding coco powder and sugar to cold brew!
- Exactly why I said "hear me out" haha
  It's not exactly a "little treat," and it has a different mouth feel to making cold brew with cocoa.

Chopped, frozen strawberries in milk. Sometimes with maple syrup. Cream if I'm feeling rich.

Fancy coffee.

Raw mushrooms dipped in Hidden Valley are pretty good.. I love how they pop lightly when your teeth pass through them. You also can't go wrong with a peanut butter and banana sandwich..

I have a copycat recipe for Taco Bells quesadilla sauce that is dirt cheap to make. I've probably made 30 liters of it in my lifetime. Smear that on a mini flour tortilla with some Great Value grilled chicken strips (no doubt made with tortured chickens to keep the price low) and a bit of shredded cheese (cheddar and monteray jack) and you've got one hell of a tasty quesadilla to fry up.

Here's the recipe for the sauce. Let me know if you get around to making it. Would love to know what you think.

1 cup mayo (I use Helman's 1/2 fat)

2 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp pickled jalapeno juice (from Old El Paso pickled jalapeños)

2 tsp cumin

2 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

A dash of salt

And how ever many diced pickled jalapeños you see fit

I've been making Alton Brown's seedy date bars. Not too much prep, and quick to snag and enjoy! Maybe 170 calories per bar

Ooh those look good! Just fruit and seeds. Looks better than the stupid granola bars that are mostly sugar.

Instant oats + brown sugar or maple syrup + seeds and/or nuts

Toast with butter and brown sugar. Super cheap, super good, and basically ingredients almost every household has.

Adding a splash of heavy cream to my cereal.

Real popcorn popped in a pot with olive oil and sea salt. Dead easy and cheap.

Vanilla yogurt with crisp rye bread / tack crumbled into it, with bilberries (forest blueberry). The sour crunchy tack, vanilla and the sweet berries compliment each other nicely.

Edit: oh and the bilberries must come straight from the freezer, thats crucial.

Oh yes! Yogurt with some crunch and fruit is just SOOO good, and you can get a like $4 tub of yogurt that lets you eat some every day for a week.

It's either chocolate milk shake or chocolate cake which is relatively cheap near my place 60 for ms and 15-30 rs for cake. But if I feel I need more I get a waffle with white + normal chocolate.

kinder bueno icecream perhaps?

Chicory salad with tomato, egg and home made mayo. Apart from salt and pepper those are the only ingredients.

Cream of wheat made with whole milk and a dab of salted butter.

Not very sweet but very rich, warm, and filling

115gr 9mm with Turkish primers and range brass. It's cheap to load--about 15cpr--just as fun as +P+, and doesn't beat the hell out of your frame.

If you have a shot timer, you can do timed draw and fire drills with a single shot from concealment, put in over an hour at the range, and only spend a few bucks in ammo.

The real splurge is 220gr 10mm. That shit is expensive any way you do it.

It's either something gummy like swedish fish or sour patch kids, or I take the time to properly make some cookies.

The free popcorn at Les Schwab

I always buy bananas and wait for them to get brown, and make banana milk with them. I'll try to freeze them and also add oats, that sounds really good

We don't keep bread in the house anymore but occasionally I want cinnamon toast. Nuke a little butter, mix in sugar & cinnamon, enjoy on saltines. It's a little messy because the sugar and butter won't completely emulsify but it scratches that itch when I'm baked.

I just go to Dollarama and get a snack . Only place I can still get get snacks for about $1 each these days.

... okay but which snacks are peak for a dollar?
I do remember when I was young though I would go to dollar tree and they would sell a pack of fudge covered graham crackers, and those were amazing.
- Any popular bar , off brand gummies small bag of chips 2 for $1 . Big bag of jalapeno Cheetos under $2 . That shit is unheard of in Canada other than at Dollarama !