Meet Loena B. Rodgers: Nutrition Detective, Owner of The Egg-cellent Breakfast Company

We had the good fortune of connecting with Loena B. Rodgers and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Loena B., what do you want your legacy to be?
I started The Egg-cellent Breakfast Company in hopes of empowering more parents to understand their bodies, their children’s and the symptoms they show when going through nutritional turbulence. And so if I were to leave a legacy, I’d like to be remembered as the “nutritional hacker” who taught them how to take care of their health and love themselves better from the inside out.

So when people feel down, or anxious, or in pain and find that ounce of hope to take action and turn to real food, my hope is that at some cellular level they remember the woman who taught them to be brave and speak the language of nutritional deficiency and that woman would so happen to be me.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Being a witness to the life-changing effects of eating real food and living a healthy lifestyle has turned me into an advocate of it. In 2012, I started my journey to becoming a Nutrition Detective, leaving no stones unturned when it comes to knowing what to feed my child and how to keep him healthy. I learned to speak “nutritional deficiency” as a language and started translating this to my peers. I curated meals that my son loves without compromising its health benefits.

Soon enough, I started sharing these proven methods and recipes to parents all around me and established The Egg-cellent Breakfast Company. Here, we conduct weekly training sessions on nutrition for FREE to the parents in our Kids Food Academy community. We also conduct virtual cooking classes and demos for kids and adults, moderate events and discussions around Food as Medicine modalities and provide one-on-one consultations for those who need individualized help understanding their bodies and knowing how to treat it well.

With this, I hope to equip parents everywhere to raise their children with egg-cellent eating habits and a healthy relationship with food for life.

Experience, tenacity, and commitment are what set me apart from others.

9 years ago I experienced one of the scariest things any parent could ever go through – bringing your child to the ER scared, helpless, and was left to only “hope for the best.” It’s an experience I wouldn’t wish on anyone, but one that has made me stronger and better than I used to be.

I wish I could tell you it was a one-off experience, but I rushed my son in and out of the ER, Urgent Care, and Allergy & Immunology doctor’s office for years. All they had to offer was a goody bag of bandaid solutions, and while I knew it was well-intentioned, I knew I needed to do more. I rolled up my sleeves and spent the next 9 years learning in all ways you can imagine: from academic journals, other coaches, doctors, and downright trial and error. My tenacity has been with me in all the years I was in search of anything that could make my son’s life better and it’s the very thing that brought me here.

Almost a decade later, Wesley’s allergy and immunology doctor praised my daily regimen as Wesley’s stress breathing test came back nearly perfect, not showing signs of asthma. He said: “whatever you’re doing, keep doing it because it’s working!”

So while there are always many other people in the market, I make sure to go above and beyond with the parents I work with. I treat their kids like my children and teach my clients everything they need to know through my workshops without them having to spend 9 years to go through it all. I put myself in their shoes, break down the information, and work with them through the toughest parts of learning.

I was very lucky to have had people who cared enough to tell me about this alternate route, without them I don’t know how this story would have ended up. But because of them, I also know that I owe it to every parent who is going through the same challenges Wesley and I had to face almost a decade ago, to educate them, empower them, and walk that road with them.

To this day, 1 in 7 children meet the criteria of childhood obesity and this is a byproduct of the lack of nutritional awareness from parents. It has not been an easy road, especially while raising two school-age children, but it has definitely been one that is worthwhile. So on days that challenge me a little harder, I tune in and dial back into my WHY. I go back to the woman I was 9 years ago – lost, helpless, and afraid and remember how much I needed the information I know now.

For the same reasons, I make it a point to keep excellence at the heart of The Egg-cellent Breakfast Company and use the same nutritional literacy tools and resources I use for my family. So, for as long as there is a child in need and a parent trying to create a better life for their children, I will be here, persevering in getting this message across. I will be here to share everything I know to keep our children healthy.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Nothing is better than good food paired with great company! After all, delicious food is a universal language. So to welcome her, I would take her out to eat at one of my Egg-cellent-approved spots, probably at Kismet or Honey Hi. Everyone knows how exhausting traveling could be so I’ll give her the rest of the day to get her and the kids settled in.

But once everyone is rested, I’d love to take them for breakfast at Sqirl, get mini facials and a mani pedi at Burke-Williams, lunch at Nordstrom and go shopping at the Americana at Brand in Glendale. For dinner, I’d be more than happy to whip something up for her and the kids to make sure they feel as at home and welcome as possible! To get prepped, I’d stop off at the Erewhon Market in Venice to show her how it looks when everything in the grocery store is truly healthful and stocked from local, high-quality farmers and vendors who really care about health and sustainability.

There are so many things to see and do in LA so for the rest of the week, I’m sure we’ll make time to visit the beach and let the kids run around, visit the children’s museum in Pasadena, and have lunch at the Mi Piace because what kid doesn’t love pasta?? Of course we can’t plan a trip without a day for shopping on Colorado Avenue and knowing how close we are to our kids, a water balloon fight will definitely be part of the plan! And while she’s in town I’ll take her to watch a show at the Pantages and what better way to bond than over some fresh produce at the local Farmer’s market?

I’d start naming all the museums we could go and visit but we might not have enough days for that, but what I’m sure will be lots of fun is hunting down the most picturesque sites of the city! If there’s something LA knows a lot of, it’s how to frame the best photos! So if you have favorite graffiti walls, let me know so my friend and I can take a lot of cute selfies! The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I’ve always believed that the people we cross paths with are those meant to create a shift within us. Whether that’s to teach us something new, to see things from another point of view, or to remind us why and how we live. And in my life, Dr. Theresa R. Peter, D.C.,M.S., CFMP did all of the above.

She is the owner of the Health Up Wellness Center in Chicago, Illinois, and the person who introduced me to the world of homeopathy. On the day we met, she taught me that my son’s allergy and asthma could be aided through the food I served him and even wrote a homeopathic script for my son, Wesley, (which I still have to this day).

Without her, I would have never learned the language of nutritional deficiency and would have probably still been subscribed to band-aid medications for my son’s symptoms.

Today, I’m confident in my son’s health because of the nutritional strategy I’ve upheld through the years. I know for a fact how tremendous every parent’s contribution is to the wellbeing and health of their kids and I know this because of her.

Sustainable healthcare used to be a big idea I never thought to be true, but when your doctor empowers you and makes you feel like a partner in your own healthcare, it’s hard not to believe it.

Thank you, Dr. Peter!

Website: www.eggcellentcompany.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eggcellentbreakfastco/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/loenarodgers/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eggcellentbreakfastco/

Other: Personal Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/loena.rodgers FREE Gift: 30-day Breakfast Calendar for Shoutout LA parents – https://bit.ly/breakfast_calendar If you are a parent, and you need support with transforming your child’s unhealthy eating habits, behavior or focus in the classroom, let’s chat. Go to bit.ly/Talk2Loena to schedule your FREE 45-minute Clarity Call.

Image Credits
Image credits (3) Luke Carricato 1) Loena with Supplement bottles on counter in kitchen, 2) Loena and sons, Isaac and Wesley running the park, 3) Loena and Wesley (sitting on counter) holding a letter board. Image credits (1) Kristie LaTray 1)Loena and Wesley as a small baby.