Definitely survey your stores for the cheapest sources of saturated fat. Butter, milk, cream cheese, sour cream, coconut oil, even meat. I don't know where you live, I assume EU, because a gallon of (zogged) milk seldom exceeds 4$ across the states from a quick google search.
If you want to be a dollar store peater you'll prolly have to make a dark bargain with the god of starch and start eating potatoes, pasta, bread, cake, etc. Just fortify them with aforementioned fats. Produce like frozen fruits, carrots, mushrooms, onions etc should be pretty cheap and are worth adding if you're going hungry.
Stews and mashes are the simplest and therefore fastest meals to get all these foods. Can easily be made in bulk and grants versatility with foods added.
If you want to completely minimize cooking time you could just load up on fruits and specific vegetables. The carrot salad is still a good option here if only for the sake of being a vector for the coconut oil, assuming you aren't already scooping it into your mouth.
For me I found success in cheesecakes. They only take ~20 minutes to prep and last for 8 days if you ration the slices, which cost about $2/slice... I dunno how that would translate for you, however. I consume it with a frozen berry milk smoothie and a bowl of oatmeal, which I intend to replace with milk powder pancakes when I learn how to cook. The appeal in any case is its versatility: you can put whatever you want in the cake, the smoothie, and the cereal (or future pancake.) Picrel, I added honey, coconut oil, and chocolate. Mind the orange cake, I had been using pumpkin since it's a cheap filling and realized only just recently I had been nuking myself with carotene. Meal costs in total about $5
Or you could just eat ice cream. That works too. It's only mildly more expensive than cream cheese. And probably faster cooking.
[image: 1710387089194-20240313_215801-resized.jpg]
