Snack Stew (10/10)

Yo you guys ever make Snack Stew? It's the best isn't it? Oh you make it all the time? Awesome! BUSTED you couldn't have because I just made it up. Are you some kind of snack poser? Cool "It's Snack O'Clock" shirt [LIFTS FIST] name three snacks.

Snack Stew is a very well balanced snack concoction that when done properly can provide you with the most satisfying, on demand snack option out there.  In the most basic terms you start off with a basic snack mixture, let's say, M&M's, some deluxe nuts maybe some banana chips. Then as you eat it you constantly add new things. Always maintaining the same level. As interesting snacks pop-up at the store like say Cookie Crisp goes on sale, or they bring out a new flavor of Beer Nut you just chuck it in. You see it doesn't become true snack stew until about five or six snack cycles. The goal of which is to achieve true snack diversity and for all the snack flavors to mix into each other. Here's how you get it going.

You want to start out with a good base, a Snack Stew broth if you will. Trail mix is a good place to begin. Not the healthy hippy kind though, follow the first rule of Snack Stew if you see chocolate bits you're Snack broth is a hit. Now Snack Stew is supposed to cover as many snack categories as possible. So we're not going all salty, doing that will just end you up in party mix country. You want savory and sweet. Balancing this tightrope is the biggest challenge of Snack Stew. You need to always maintain a mixture of only complimentary snackables. You're chocolates, nuts, dehydrated marshmallows, Golden Grahams, banana chips, your candied or chocolate covered nuts. The list goes on but I think you know what I'm talking about. If you make a mistake and throw in a gummy bear in that mixture, you're toast, better throw that stew out because it only takes one flavor clash to throw the whole thing off.

And as I said as you eat it throughout the week keep filling it back up with new snacks, and stir it around again. A good litmus test for your Snew is take a handful and count how many different things there are. You always want to maintain an eighty percent snack diversity rating, or SD number (a term coined by me just now). So the average handful is about 14 morsels, so you want about a 10-12 different items. Anymore than that and it's a waste. And consider your hand size when creating your snew, Shaq would want an SD number around 18 where Donald trump should be shooting for 4 or 5.

I'm counting an SD of 13 here

That's a lot of different snacks you might say but fear not, every aisle of the grocery store can supply you with great inspiration. A great section for example is the baking aisle, it always has a variety of different chocolate chips, nut crumbles, Score bits, marshmallows. Next we have the cereal aisle, Golden Grahams have always been a great addition to Snew, Corn Pops, Captain Crunch all great. It's the perfect filler that compliments the mix while the muted flavors don't overpower the rest of the Snew. Another good one is the section between the cookies and crackers. You got your Teddy-grahams and carmel corn, a new addition I've been really into is what Pepperidge Farm has been doing with their cookie based Goldfish series. Their S'mores is great because that covers three different flavs (graham, chocolate, marshmallow)

Cost wise, it's gonna hurt going out and buying all the ingredients at once but if you stretch it over the course of a few weeks you won't feel a thing. There is something very satisfy about dumping in a box of Goobers and Raisinets into a half bag of snew and mixing it around. Also try and keep at least 20 percent to higher quality things, like deluxe nuts to really amp up your stew. Once it's done keep it in a ziplock bag, always making sure to squeeze all the air out to maintain freshness, because it would be a shame to lose the high SD, sixth generation snew you've been working on for weeks to snack's worst enemy, staleness.

From then on, when you're ever hungry but can't figure out what you want to snack on, just ladle out some snack stew into a bowl and you're taken care of, because it's all the snacks bud.

There is only one rule when it comes to Snack Stew, and this point is mostly for the ladies. NO PICKING ALLOWED. YOU HEAR ME! Don't you dare sit there picking out all your favs, because not only do you lose out on the spirit of the Snew you also throw off the entire balance.  Feel free to send in your own Snack Stew recipes. Enjoy