Armed with viral videos and her nutrient-dense, regeneratively sourced recipes, La Jolla’s Gretchen Adler is a rising culinary influencer and businesswoman. And she’s on a mission to spark what she calls an “ancestral culinary revolution.”
Adler is the founder and face of Gretchy, a company that promotes healthy, locally sourced meals. Adler has amassed a large following on social media, where she showcases her lifestyle and home-cooked dishes, often with voiceovers and recipes in the videos’ captions.
With more than 450,000 followers on Instagram (@gretchy) and over 2.9 million likes on TikTok (@thehealthywife), Gretchy’s audience continues to grow. Two of Adler’s TikTok videos, outlining her homemade spin on Pop-Tarts and Cheez-Its, drew 5.5 million and 6.7 million views, respectively.
Adler said she has been educating herself about food and how it impacts people’s health for more than a decade. Six years ago, she developed the Nourishing Kitchen Master Class, a $98 online program with “bite-size” explanations of Adler’s philosophy on cooking.
Since then, she established a subscription-based newsletter and an expansive list of recipes on her website, gretchy.com. Access to recipes and additional content starts at $3 per week.
“It’s definitely been a journey,” Adler said. “It’s not like it happened overnight, but it’s exciting because my mission is to educate people and to inspire them to lead healthier lives and to use food as their medicine.”
Along with her work, Adler describes herself as a mom, traditional wife and homemaker.
She said she has always been drawn to food but had a complicated relationship with it. Growing up, she said, she struggled with her skin and physical appearance — something she attributes to a lack of nutrients and negative eating habits.
“I realized that my supplements I was taking for a long time weren’t really doing what they were supposed to be doing,” Adler said. “I was still deficient, and a lot of nutrients I had previously were vegan and plant-based and I just didn’t have the energy I wanted. I didn’t feel my best.”
The birth of her second daughter pushed Adler to pursue healthier choices both for her and her children. She also adopted an “ancestral diet,” which rejects processed food in favor of homegrown vegetables and traditionally prepared grains, among other natural processes.
The shift was inspired largely by the work of Dr. Weston Price, a Canadian dentist and dietitian who studied Western diets in contrast with other cultures around the world. His findings were published in his 1939 book “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.”
After ditching seed oils, artificial sugars, dyes and preservatives, Adler said she feels more energetic, creative and ionate about her work. She said she hopes more people will drop many popular brands and opt for their own kitchen.
“The main issue is that people are misinformed — they haven’t been educated on the impacts that food has on their health,” Adler said. “A lot of people trust what they see on the front of the box. They trust ‘Big Food.’”
Along with her popularity, Adler has faced some backlash on social media. Some commenters on her most viral videos have called her recipes “inconvenient,” “unrealistic” or “costly.”
Adler said she’s not letting the negative comments affect her work.
“I do know that I’m making a very positive impact on the people I am reaching that do want the content,” she said.
“I think that if your health is a priority, which hopefully it is to most people, then you need to find a little bit of time to prioritize the foods you eat.”
Adler said she is determined to expand her brand and continue ing on her message of healthy eating.
“I want people to me for [being] somebody that inspired them to take charge of their health and to live the best life they can live,” Adler said. “Food could be so simple, but it has such a massive impact if you do it right or if you do it wrong. And we can do whatever we want in our lives if we have good health.” ♦
