We went away to the North German coast for a few days. It wasn’t a remote spot, though you might have thought it from the deserted beaches and windswept sand dunes. The surrounding infrastructure – discount supermarkets, cafes, restaurants – suggested summer saw busier days.

As is standard on holidays with small children, when we first arrived we went to the village’s only supermarket (a Netto) to stock up. Our list was modest: apples, bananas, cheese, butter, milk, bread, yoghurt, and jam. Mostly, we thought, we’d eat out.

Despite the simplicity of our culinary ambitions, Netto proved disappointing. Call me a snob, but I don’t believe not sure I have ever been in a supermarket with fewer things I might consider buying. Wherever we turned, we found junk. There are no other words for it.

Bread, both white and brown, was laden with sugar and preservatives. Organic diary products (aside from milk – our one success) were nowhere to be found. That, I don’t mind so much, but I do mind cheese coloured and sweetened and manipulated into a form so far removed from cheese you might as well give it a different name. After a long search I found the one pack (pre-sliced) containing only milk and salt. No mean feat.

From there, we moved on to the fruit and vegetables, confident things could only look up. Fresh food is fresh food after all – and largely unadulterated. But of course they didn’t. Apples, although there are plenty of German apples left to buy at this time of year, were from Italy (all bruised or rotten) and Argentina (we bought these out of desperation, despite the distance). I had toyed with the idea of buying a lemon, but quickly changed my mind on finding the full crate completely mouldy.

I tell you this because? The quest to live well is stymied by this sort of experience. I’m lucky because I can afford to shop in other places at home where the range is far greater. But if I were to live here, I would have no choice. I suppose I could travel to the next village and try their Lidl instead, but I doubt the experience would be very different.

In restaurants we fared a little better, but only thanks to local herring. If we had turned our noses up at fried fish (though who could), we would have been left with the rest of the menu – a rather sorry selection of frozen, heavily seasoned, and altogether uninspiring food. The side salad I deigned to order once arrived with a distinct whiff of the 1980s. Tinned sweetcorn and iceberg lettuce tossed in bottled salad dressing – just dare imagine the list of ingredients in there. Free range egg powder, it is not. I’d have preferred it plain. We did discover one shop selling fresh and local produce, about five miles away. I could have skipped for joy when I first saw the pert spinach leaves and trailing foliage of kohlrabi, until I saw the price. Good food does not come cheap in out of season holiday resorts.

I know I am spoilt by the wealth of greengrocers and organic supermarkets which line the streets where we live. I am spoilt too by having enough money to shop there, though I still think carefully about what is worth extra pennies or not. But for all this awareness of my own good fortune, it does not seem quite right that these products, which don’t deserve to even be called food, are all that’s on offer for most people. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that people are being cheated out of the opportunity to eat better. How can you buy local apples and organic eggs if there aren’t any for miles around? You can’t. And, if a packet of yellowed fat, salt, and mysterious chemicals is presented to you as cheese, and you’d never thought to study the small print, how would you know you’re being sold a sham of the real thing? You won’t.

Nutritional education must go hand in hand with higher standards in the supermarkets and from food producers. Otherwise, we’ll all get fat without really understanding why. The herring was delicious though.