Visiting the supermarket can be quite stressful.

If you then try to select the products to the best of your knowledge and belief, it can get really nerve-wracking.

Before I even go to the supermarket, I usually ask myself what is particularly important to me: Do I want to shop plastic-free as possible?

Or regional and seasonal?

Or cruelty-free?

The selection of products is so large these days and yet you don't seem to be able to do everything “right”.

In any case, I am faced with challenging purchase decisions every time.

1. Plastic is everywhere

Cucumbers in plastic packaging?

Does it really have to be?

If you take a closer look around the supermarket you trust, you will find only a few products that are sold unpacked.

Many products do not even need the packaging.

But plastic is everywhere.

Even the frozen pizza in the paper box is also packed in plastic.

Sure, plastic also has its place, after all, plastic keeps our food fresh.

But my cucumber really doesn't need a plastic coat.

And my pasta could just as easily be sold in glass or paper packaging.

It can't be that difficult - unpackaging shops have been leading the way for a long time.

2. Apples from the other end of the world

It's pretty crazy that we have access to food from all over the world all year round - so theoretically we never have to go without anything.

Pretty luxurious.

And yet I could get annoyed regularly when I read “Apples from Chile” or “Broccoli from Turkey”.

Why do we let these products fly halfway around the world?

Apples and broccoli really exist in Germany now.

How much CO2 could be saved if food were not constantly being jetted around the globe.

And it's also a good feeling to buy the apples from the farmer around the corner - at least you know under what conditions they were grown.

3. Animal suffering is cheap

I also often wonder about prices when shopping.

Vegan, i.e. cruelty-free variants, are usually more expensive than the products for which living beings had to suffer.

Can that be right at all?

Various seals of approval also have their price.

Meat, on the other hand, is often thrown afterwards.

It is questionable whether all of this is still related to one another.

How can it be that a Tetra Pak cow's milk costs less than half the price of oat milk?

After all, a living being had to serve for the former.

And although I know all of this, I sometimes resort to the cheaper alternative.

Simply because they exist.

4. The lesser evil

So it is not uncommon for me to find myself in front of the supermarket shelf and try to weigh up which product would be the “lesser evil”. Do I now prefer to use the organic product wrapped in plastic? Are the regional eggs from the farm around the corner more sustainable than those with the “No chick shredding” seal? Which milk alternative is the most ecological? Is it still acceptable to buy avocados or mangoes? Or should I stick to regional fruit and vegetables? And why is it all so opaque and badly labeled? In the case of processed products, for example, it is not that easy to see at first glance where the ingredients come from and how they were produced. It is always a challenge to find your way in the jungle of offers,to look through and make a good decision.

5. Still a guilty conscience

The subject is complex, you can't do everything right.

That's why you can sometimes despair when shopping.

I often look at my achievements and still have a guilty conscience because I didn't want to do without my beloved avocados again.

Or because in my mind's eye I can already see the mountain of plastic that will result from the purchase.

But it's not about making everything perfect.

It's about re-creating awareness of our food, its production and its origin.

And maybe in the future it will no longer have to be the apples from Chile.