Buying pre-packaged snacks can add a lot to your grocery bill, especially if you’ve got children (or teens in my case). They seem to have ‘hollow legs’ and no amount of snacks or meals will fill them up. You also don’t want to be baking every day. Not everyone has the time. Here are a few ideas of how to save money buying snacks for your family.

Popcorn

Popcorn is so cheap to buy and easy to make. (The kids can make it in the microwave in a brown paper bag, as long as they are careful getting it out.) A little bit goes a long way.

In fact, I buy it in a 1kg bag for less than $5 and I reckon it lasts 12 months. With some basic pantry ingredients, you can make sweet or savoury versions of different popcorn flavours.

For kids who are used to eating packaged chips etc, it might be a hard habit to get into but it’s worth breaking up the chip snacks with the occasional popcorn in their lunch boxes or for an after school snack.

Potato Chips & Cheesy Snacks

If you absolutely, positively have to buy potato chips (or similar) snack items for lunch boxes or snacks, buy the larger packets and put into smaller bags. (You can reuse ziplock bags. Just give them a rinse out or use a container or paper bag to put them in.)

Using the Coles homebrand as an example, check out these cost comparisons:

Cheezels

1 x 110g box Cheezels @ $2.40 / 10 bags ($2.18/100gm) = $0.24 cents per bag
1 x 170g bag Coles Cheese Tubes @ $1.50 / 10 bags ($0.88/100gm) = $0.15 cents per bag

Difference of $0.90 per bag
Buying homebrand once per week = Savings of $46.80 per year

Potato Chips

1 x 380g 20 pack brand name box of chip packets @ $5.50 / 20 bags ($1.45/100gm) = $0.28 cents per bag
1 x 175g packet Coles homebrand chips (plain, salt & vinegar, chicken flavours) @ $1.60 / 10 bags ($0.91/100gm) = $0.16 cents per bag

Difference of $2.20 per 20 bags of chips
Buying 2 x homebrand packets per week = Savings of $119.60 per year

As you can see, nearly double the price if you buy the individual packets. Try to bag them up as soon as you get home and HIDE them!

You can apply this principle to any packaged snacks like pretzels, corn chips etc. Always go the larger bag of homebrand snacks from the supermarket and bag them up yourself.

Nuts

Nuts are a great snack for older children (and obviously who don’t have allergies) because they contain a lot of protein which keeps them fuller for longer.

Nuts can be expensive though but if you put a couple nuts into a trail mix of popcorn, pretzels, dried fruit like sultanas and even a few choc chips in the mix, they make a tasty snack and a lot will go along way. Think almonds, walnuts, pecans or even peanuts.

Dried Fruit

Dried fruit chopped up and mixed into a trail mix, as above, or on their own make a good healthy snack alternative especially when you run out of fresh fruit. It also mixes up your baked goods. Dried apricots, dates, sultanas or any dried fruit for that matter, are great in cookies, cakes, slices or bliss balls.

Bliss Balls

I don’t know where Bliss Balls were when I was growing up but I wish they were around. I love them myself for a mid morning, healthier snack and they really don’t take anytime to make at all.

You don’t need fancy ingredients. Usually a base of oats, any nut butter, a sticky sweetener like sugar-free maple syrup or honey and then add blitzed dried fruit like apricots or dates, add blitzed nuts and/or coconut and roll into balls using a small ice cream scoop and keep in the fridge.

One or two in your child’s lunch box and then a few on an afternoon tea platter of fresh fruit, cookies, popcorn and/or any baked goods should keep them full until dinner time.

You don’t even have to make them into balls. Roll it into a log shape, pop in the fridge to firm up and cut into slices like I did for these Apricot & Coconut Bites.

High Protein Snacks

Snacks with a high protein will always fill your hungry family members bellies.

Things like boiled eggs, slices of deli style meats, cheese cubes or slices etc will always go down a treat in a lunch box or on an afternoon tea platter for your children.

Throw on some pickled onions, gherkins or olives too if they’re to your children’s tastes along with some crackers or homemade pita bread chips. These can be made from Lebanese bread or even tortilla which have been sprayed with a little oil, sprinkled with your favourite seasons and baked in the oven until crisp.

Sweet or Savoury Scrolls

If you don’t have a lot of time for baking, these pastry scrolls are great to pop into the oven while the oven is on (like when you’re cooking dinner.)

One sheet of puff pastry will make up about 18 small scrolls (if you cut them into 1cm slices).

Just spread with your favourite spread like Vegemite or lay ham or salami slices on the pastry, a sprinkle of grated cheese, roll up and bake for about 20 minutes in a 200 deg C oven. I’ve even made them by spreading butter on the puff pastry sheet, sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar and they taste like doughnuts.

They can be frozen and taken out as needed or eat straight away.

You can also do these with a basic scone dough or my 2 ingredient Greek yoghurt pizza dough for more substantial scrolls. Add anything you like to the dough itself like fresh or dried herbs, grated cheese of any kind and fill with meats for a savoury version or spread with Nutella and/or fresh fruit for a sweet version.

Baked Goods

I love baking but I don’t want to be in the kitchen all day baking either, especially when my kids devour it as soon as I pull it out of the oven. I want a lot baked in a short amount of time with as few ingredients as possible.

My Bulk Cookie mix using only 5 ingredients will allow you to create a few different flavoured cookies at once and makes a nice, crunchy cookie.

Double or triple a basic muffin batter and make 3 different flavoured muffins at once.

You can check out my Best of Lunch Box Baking with Pantry Staples recipes here.

Fresh Fruit and Vegetables

You can’t beat it for healthy snack option but sometimes they can be expensive. Only buy what’s in season.

You can also save some money by buying frozen or canned fruit. It will last longer and having a couple cans of tinned fruit in the pantry to use when all the fresh has been used up is a handy standby.

I like to dispense a can of tinned fruit into small containers and mix up a jelly and add that to the fruit for fruit and jelly cups.

Carrots, celery, capsicum, baby corn, radishes etc etc all make great dippers for a homemade dip like hummus or another homemade dip made with cream cheese.

To make a simple dip, buy the homebrand spreadable cream cheese or use sour cream and mix in chutneys, relishes, soup mix packets or use a salsa for dipping.

Don’t forget sweet dips too for fruit. Greek yoghurt flavoured with a little vanilla and unsweetened maple syrup is great for strawberries, other berries, apple and pear slices, bananas etc.

I also like to buy the occasional bag of marshmallows for hot chocolates, for baking or to make fruit kebabs where I thread chopped fruit and a marshmallow on a skewer for an afternoon snack.

Don’t forget about making a fruit smoothie for an afternoon snack and even freeze them into icy poles. You can grab the icy pole molds here.

There are so many different ideas for snacks. Your best inspiration is from the supermarket itself. If the supermarket sells it you can bet that there’s a recipe online for it. Don’t go out of your way to buy special ingredients but search for an easy recipe version of it.

If your children are used to those pre-packaged snacks, it’s time to make a change. Not only will it be healthier for them, you’ll save a ton of money. My kids have gotten used to my home baking and realising that not everything comes out of a packet from the supermarket.