Cheap-ass snacks that still make an impression
You can of course lounge around like a bunch of park-dwelling slackers and tear open a bag of Chipito’s with your friends, but if you feel like making a bit more of an effort, you can do that perfectly well on a budget. These are our favorite items to stock up on for that occasion. You don’t have to set your credit card on fire for an impressive snack board. This is how we do it.
Cheese
Chaource isn’t just my favorite in terms of flavor (think salty-fresh, just-spreadable raw cow’s milk cheese), it’s also pretty affordable: for six euros, you can bring home half a cheese that will easily make four people happy. Things always get a little out of hand with me at Kef, but we’re not talking about that now. And if you happen to be both thrifty and nostalgic, you’ll of course bring home a piece of Président brie. Truly impressive: barbecued brie.
Dumplings
Head to the Asian supermarket with a cheerful wallet! For a few euros per bag, you can literally bring home dozens of frozen dumplings with wildly interesting fillings like kimchi or duck. At home, fish your steamer basket out from the back of the cupboard, stir a dollop of sriracha into a few spoonfuls of ketchup, and if you really want to show off, put chopsticks on the table too. Guaranteed success.
‘Foreign’ delicacies
Okay, Lidl is simply German, and they don’t carry these items as standard, but hey, that’s also what makes them delicacies! They do make regular comebacks, though, so as soon as you see them: stock up big.
- Belgian pretzels: shape matters, so you can say this is basically an ordinary salty breadstick, but somehow it snacks differently in such a cozy twist. And okay, size matters too, and these are extra large.
- Green giant olives: those gigantic, firm green ones with pits, in a budget-friendly one-kilo jar. Love it.
- Amarena cherries: those cherries they put in the yogurt-cherry ice cream at the ice cream parlor, with those deep-purple swirls, and then you order that and often don’t even get a single one of those stupid cherries in your scoop. You can tell it runs deep with me—which is why I bring those jars home. With vanilla ice cream, and then as many cherries as you want. They also work surprisingly well in a whiskey sour when you once again can’t find any Maraschino cherries.
- Olives stuffed with anchovies: they sell these in double-sized tins, so you can snack on them even more enthusiastically.
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