Bread and peanut butter. And coffee. Can’t forget the coffee.

A friend was down to his last ten bucks with a week to payday. He bought a bag of potatoes. Kept him from starving.

Rice and beans.

My bare minimum grocery list pretty much always consists of: milk, eggs, rye bread, coffee, yogurt, lettuce, cucumber, lunchmeat. cottage cheese. I try to keep frozen chicken breasts or some kind of fish in the freezer most of the time, as well.

A loaf of bread, a carton of eggs, and some cheese.

One should always have staples in their pantry, long before the money runs out: cans of beans, cans of soup, canned nuts, pasta & sauce, rice, peanut butter, canned veggies such as tomatoes, green beans, and corn.

My Mom always said if you have milk, eggs, and bread, there is food in the house.

^add sugar and cinnamon and you have a treat!

Caviar
Powdered unicorn horn
Yak milk

Toilet paper.

Porridge oats and milk.

I agree with @kardamom about having staples. When you go to the store, if they have a sale on cans of soup, beans or anything else you like, go ahead and buy them. Just because they are in your pantry doesn’t mean you have to eat them before the end of the month.
Stock up on food that fills you up.
Good luck!

Eggs, cottage cheese, peanut butter and bread.

Since I don’t eat eggs or drink milk, they wouldn’t be priorities for me. Maybe Raisinets?

At a minimum, this link

Maybe this if you can find them

Or perhaps this one

Milk, bread, potatoes.

Tuna used to be cheaper than air, and a good source of protein, but a can is getting pretty pricey. I still keep a few in the pantry just in case.

I try hard to keep pantry and freezer stocked, but sometimes good planning isn’t good enough.
I have frequently relied on peanut butter to survive lean times.
Potatoes are great help, and cheap, but they go bad before I finish them. Dry beans and rice are both easy to store without going bad, and they are good together. Avoid pasta.
I keep canned soup and broth on hands, and when my bread isn’t very fresh anymore, it goes right back to good when dunked in broth
Avoid TV dinners. They are the devil’s family recipe.

If I were in that predicament, it would depend on how much money I could spare (until payday) and what foods I like to eat (within reason, of course), and when payday was (how long till you get the money).

Bread, eggs, cereal and milk.

You can have fried egg sandwiches, eggs & toast, french toast, boiled eggs, egg salad sandwiches. Then cereal & milk for the other meals/days.

Eggs and bananas

Big ass bags of spaghetti and cheap cans of spaghetti sauce and a loaf of bread. I can eat spaghetti sandwiches forever.

Peanut butter and celery