Grocery Shopping Week 3: Food Lion

Food Lion Scores
Better World Shopper: D+

Distance from my apartment: 1.3 miles (4 minutes)

Food Lion has the advantage of being my corner grocery store. Since it's only a mile from my apartment, in theory I could walk there (if I was willing to risk my life walking on the highway that leads there). If I ever get a bike trailer (someday soon, I hope!), I could take the long route and bike to the grocery store. And since the farmer's market is just down the road, I could do all my grocery shopping in one morning. Plus, when I announced that we were shopping at Food Lion today, First Son exclaimed, "Hurray! My favorite grocery store!" They have the shopping carts that are shaped like race cars...

Unfortunately, Food Lion is tied with Walmart for the fewest natural, fair trade, and organic items. In the produce section, I found organic bananas, but I didn't buy them because they were wrapped in plastic and the overpackaging of organic foods has become a sore spot with me. Why, oh why, do they do that??? They also had organic baby food and hormone-free milk, and that was it. They didn't even have Stonyfield Farm yogurt, which you can generally find at any grocery store.

The question I'm asking now is what's more important: buying everything natural and organic, or cutting down on emissions by biking to the grocery store?

Here are the usual suspects:

tofu
cheddar cheese (4 cup bag)
frozen apple juice (2)
butter
milk
applesauce
organic baby food (7 jars)
organic baby cereal (2 boxes)
tortillas (family pack)
cereal (2 boxes)
yogurt
avocado
carrots
bananas
mushrooms

Total: $47.54