Robert Is Here

Robert Is Here started in 1959 as a six-year-old boy’s produce table on a folding stand near the edge of the Redland agricultural district southwest of downtown Homestead. His father, a local farmer, encouraged young Robert Moehling to sell surplus cucumbers from a card table by the road. Nobody stopped, so his dad made a hand painted sign reading Robert Is Here, and traffic started pulling in. More than six decades later, the stand has grown into one of South Florida’s most recognized farm markets, still run by the Moehling family on the same corner near the entrance to Everglades National Park.

What sets Robert Is Here apart from a typical grocery produce aisle is the range of tropical and subtropical fruit grown by Redland farmers that rarely shows up anywhere else. Depending on the season, bins hold guanabana, black sapote, canistel, longan, lychee, starfruit, mamey, several kinds of mango, and dozens of citrus varieties, much of it grown within a few miles of the stand. The business also bottles its own key lime products, sells local honey, jams, and pickled vegetables, and stocks dried fruit and nuts for visitors heading into the national park for the day.

The fruit milkshakes are the reason many people first hear about the place. Made to order with whatever fruit is in season, blended with ice cream, they come in flavors that change with the harvest calendar, from key lime and mango to more unusual choices like soursop or dragon fruit. Lines form at the shake counter on weekends, especially during the winter tourist season when Redland produce is at its peak and traffic down US-1 or Krome Avenue is busy with visitors headed to the Everglades or the Keys.

Behind the retail stand, the property includes a small petting zoo area with goats and other farm animals, a butterfly garden, and picnic tables shaded by mature tropical trees. It gives the stop a slower, farm visit feel rather than a quick grab and go, which is part of why families build a Robert Is Here visit into a full afternoon rather than a five minute stop.

The business remains family run, with the Moehling family still overseeing daily operations and sourcing relationships with Redland growers who have sold to the stand for generations. That continuity matters in an area where agricultural land has steadily given way to development, and it is part of why longtime Miami-Dade residents treat a visit here as a check-in on the health of local farming as much as a snack stop.

Visitors should expect both cash and card accepted, a steady flow of tour buses and rental cars during peak winter season, and fruit that will not last as long once it reaches home, since much of it is harvested close to ripe. Anyone curious about Florida produce beyond citrus and strawberries will find staff happy to explain what a canistel tastes like or how to eat a sapodilla.