Into the Fridge 🥭
Rachelle Robinett on traditional Costa Rican breakfasts and finding the right life to live
Rachelle Robinett 🥭
Rachelle Robinett, RH (AHG) is an author, herbalist, recovered entrepreneur, and self-proclaimed explorer of the human experience. For over a decade, she worked at the intersection of health, nature and the pursuit of a well-lived life, helping to build companies at the forefront of natural wellness in NYC. She’s the author of Naturally: The Herbalist’s Guide to Health and Transformation and her Substack, Thinking, Naturally. Rachelle is currently based between Costa Rica and New York, as evidenced by her rather fruitful (ha) fridge (and life).
What is your fridge philosophy?
Fresh colorful essentials. It should be pleasurable, abundant, and a little playful.
Your fridge is always always always stocked with ____.
Greens, fruit, eggs, fresh coconuts, local butter, gluten-free bread, dark chocolate, and natilla, a local Costa Rican soft cheese.
Also: supplements and skincare.
In the freezer: Local meats and fish, açaí and frozen bananas for smoothies.
Top 5 condiment picks, go.
Ketchup! That is all.
Fine, I’ll open it up to pantry too. Let’s hear your favorite snacks / pantry staples:
My pantry is pretty minimal as I’m not big on packaged stuff. Granola, corn chips, local peanut butter, rice and beans. I also live in the land of freshness, so most food is purchased and cooked same-day.
What’s new in my pantry since moving to Costa Rica is an emergency kit for when the power goes out, which is often in the rainy season. Flashlights and candles, bottled water, tinned fish and cans of beans. We’re never offline for too long, but often it’s right around dinner time.
A meal that’s on heavy rotation these days:
Gallo pinto! This is the traditional Costa Rican breakfast of rice and beans with fried egg, sweet plantain, avocado, tomato and cheese. It’s always perfect and especially so after surfing.
Also on heavy rotation: An açaí bowl topped with fruit, granola, and a big scoop of local peanut butter; red snapper carpaccio; and my daily smoothie, which has been more or less the same for like ten years now (rotating protein, fruit, greens, and fiber types for variety).
Let’s go a little deeper…
What’s the mantra you keep coming back to?
Life is short.
It sounds a bit dire but I’ve had this sensation for as long as I can remember and, for obvious reasons, that awareness is highly motivating. I don’t take a single hour for granted and am very selective about how and who I share my time with. This mantra motivates my smallest decisions on a daily basis, and also the biggest ones—like my recent choice to leave marriage, home, and country to move to a beachside jungle in Costa Rica.
What products / practices are part of your regular mental wellness habits?
Journaling has been a lifelong practice for me, though I wouldn’t even call it a practice so much as an extension of my mind or manner of breathing. I write every day—often multiple times a day. It’s how I think, how I record and understand what I feel, and how I honor the good fortune of knowing my calling.
Beyond that: daily exercise (my medicine—this is non-negotiable), regular psychotherapy, and strong boundaries around inputs—social media, media in general, and forms of stimulation other than the natural. These boundaries aren’t defined, I just feel them—and they feel like a sensitivity to the imbalance and distraction that overconsumption causes. The cost of constant consumption is the loss of direct experience.
And your physical?
For fitness, it’s sleep first and always. Exercise next, and every day. I live to be active so am constantly adjusting my routine and trying new things. Most of all it includes: Strength training multiple times per week, surfing as much as possible, cycling, running, tons of walking, and dance (freestyle or salsa, which I’m taking lessons for now). I also eat according to my training, and since moving to Costa Rica that’s meant eating as much as I possibly can in order to keep up with the energy expenditure.
For beauty, and because I’m outdoors most of every day now, SPF is huge. On my face and neck, I’m also regular with vitamin C (SkinCeuticals) and retinol (purchased here locally). When I go back to the states, I get BBL + Moxi lasers (a couple times a year if possible) and need to start with the microneedling. I’ve also started using exfoliating and retinol creams on my body, which gets a ton of sun exposure.
Despite the fact that I was even more dedicated to fitness and beauty when I lived in the U.S., I’ve never been stronger, happier, or healthier than I am now—which is a testament to finding the right life to live.
What do think is the most underrated part of wellness?
The basics. I’ve said it thousands of times and wrote about it in my book: the foundations of health haven’t changed! It’s wildly unsexy in an era of endless wellness stacks, biohacks, and optimization, but it’s true. If we get our sleep, stress, movement, nutrition, and community right—often by doing less, not more—we need remarkably little else, despite being constantly encouraged to consume more in pursuit of feeling well.
Also: Herbalism! I truly believe herbalism is what so many of us are seeking without realizing it. It’s a system of health—of, really, life-care—that offers deeply personalized support for nearly everything: from the physical to the emotional to the psychic. It is entirely natural and not only improves our health, but expands our self-awareness and changes lives in surprising and profound ways. Herbalism isn’t just about better digestion, deeper sleep, or balanced hormones, it’s a guide for redesigning our relationship with ourselves, our bodies, and the living world.
Okay also: Bloodwork. Get your labs, get the most comprehensive ones you can (I love Function for this) and only then eat / live / buy the products and supplements you actually need. It’s fun to consume stuff we simply want as well—I’m all for experimentation and nice-to-haves—but guessing about whether or not we need something for our health is not my preferred way to spend time or money.
And overrated?
I don’t even know where to start. Honestly, the current state of wellness is why I no longer work in wellness.
Picture this: you wake up one morning and feel like shit. What’s your next move:
Fun question. First I’d self-reflect and try to determine the cause. But, assuming it’s a mystery, this is what I’d do:
Drink more than enough water with electrolytes; eat as well as possible with an emphasis on protein and fiber (because poor sleep destabilizes blood sugar which makes us feel crave-y and overly hungry at odd times, and also because unstable blood sugar is often why we don’t feel well when we don’t know why we don’t feel well); exercise and do it early and outside if possible; early afternoon nap.
Those are the essentials. On top of that, for those inclined, I’d use herbs:
Nervines (like chamomile, lavender, or passionflower) if I feel anxious
Digestive bitters and carminatives like gentian and citrus peels if it’s my gut
Ginger, turmeric, oregano, and functional mushrooms if it seems to be a cold or flu
Nourishing diuretics like nettle, red clover, and alfalfa if it was related to alcohol (which it wouldn’t be because I don’t drink ;))
I also really like amino acids, which are some of the quickest-acting easy-to-use supplements out there. L-theanine for calm focus, 5-HTP or tryptophan for mood, or GABA for sleep.
Give us your ride or die wellness products:
Internal: Metagenics SeroSyn, ashwagandha (Gaia Pro’s is great), NOW’s Chaste Berry and Black Cohosh blends, turmeric/curcumin, kava (I love a tincture, or Up Side’s lozenges), l-theanine. Rose Los Angeles Deep Sleep gummies (if I’m in New York or writing a book in my head instead of sleeping), electrolytes.
External: Oil cleanser (Living Libations makes a gorgeous one though I recently started using straight jojoba oil, which is far more economical), Shiseido and Supergoop SPFs, SkinCeuticals C E Ferulic and P-TIOX serums, retinol (face and body), a good moisturizer.
One thing you do everyday that makes you the most YOU version of yourself:
I write.
Whose taste inspires you?!
I’m inspired by local Costa Ricans who live happily and healthfully with so little—who choose to be grateful, reverent, playful, and positive simply because it’s a new day.
I’m inspired by my friends—my girls as I call them—who have all chosen so tastefully to live lives of their own.
And, I’m inspired far more by an intrinsic sense of preference than by external sources. Much of my life and work centers on beginning from within because it is genuinely a way of life for me. I see so many people struggle to make sense of which influences to follow or absorb, but I don’t believe that’s the best approach. We know that the creative process is ultimately one of channeling an inner—and often from-beyond—set of forces into a creative output. Our lives are no different; they, too, are works of art.
Big thank you to Rachelle for sharing this glimpse into her life with us. You can follow her on Instagram, read her Substack, and find her fridge favorites + more here.
Feel free to leave a comment or respond to this email with questions you want asked, people you want featured, or anything else that’s on your mind. Don’t be shy, I love hearing from you.
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Honored to be featured. Thanks @Katie Stone!
should we all just move to costa rica tho?