The role of financial engagement in household food insecurity is arguably nowhere more important than in impoverished rural regions that are vulnerable to seasonal fluctuations in food availability and access, and a range of other less predictable shocks and stressors. Financial engagement theoretically helps smooth food consumption across these challenges and provides more choice in balancing consumption needs. An emerging literature has shed light on seasonal food security and investigated financial engagement's role in alleviating food insecurity. However, due to the scarcity of high-frequency data, we still know little about how financial engagement is connected to contemporary food security, capturing seasonality and real-time shock experiences. This study aims to help fill this gap, utilizing high-frequency monthly data on 6,000 rural Malawians. We use financial engagement, five different food security measurements, and shock experiences while controlling for seasonality. We find that while credit is positively associated with average dietary diversity and food security-related coping strategies among rural households during the lean and growing season, it can be negatively associated with food security indicators during the secondary and main harvest under specific circumstances. A similar relationship also exists between savings and insurance, and food security. Generally, the association between financial engagement and food security is heterogeneous across different food security indicators. It strongly depends on three factors: the type of financial engagement, the timing in terms of growing seasons, and the nature and the number of the shocks household experiences.