About Us
Food As A Means For Healing
Celebrating the strive for better health through nutrition and full-body wellness is the center of our work. We cultivate mindful connections to food and cooking through years of applied experience working with an all-inclusive approach that brings folks together. We know the importance of focusing on physical and mental health, early-childhood education, tweens and teens, and just regular every-day adulting and what it means to be connected to the meals we eat and how we feel eating them.
Come for the cooking lessons, the science notes, the gentle connection between community, the helping-hand for advice and guidance, the delicious recipes that will fill your kitchen over and over, and for the body you nurture and show up for everyday.
Our Story
As a mother and daughter duo that have both struggled with health issues, subsequently grew-up fully immersed in the food industry, and were privy to the cutthroat nature that is Los Angeles and nutrition, our idea to start LŪNA was born on a sunny winter day in SoCal's Descanso Gardens, where we quite literally sat down with our rapidly condensating coffee cups and thought, 'hey, wouldn't it be cool to make a business together where we could help coach people through food?', which was, to an unending degree, a task we were already passionate about. After all, Marguerita (read more about her amazing career in her bio), had already been private-cheffing in LA and NYC for 25+ years with a multitude of clients she helped through health struggles, and so naturally Forrest, in contrast, had spent quite a few formative years sitting on the kitchen floor as a toddler watching intently, and working in the food industry as soon as she hit her teens.
And thus, LŪNA Wellness was formed into existence, ideas pouring out at family dinners, late-night diner meetings, bleary-eyed 3 am texting notes, and the inevitable car monologue. People often ask us how on earth we manage to work together, and it sounds super clichéd, but the answer is food. Eating and cooking truly are what bring us together as community, and we keep this at the heart of everything we do.
Meet The Team
Marguerita grew up in New Jersey just 10 minutes outside of Manhattan. After a long struggle with her health in her teens and early twenties she attended the Natural Gourmet Institute for Food and Health. Marguerita wanted a culinary education that would focus on delicious health supportive cuisine. As she began her career as a health supportive chef and cooking instructor in NYC, she discovered her love of teaching. She has continued to teach adults and children of all ages for over twenty years in NJ, NYC & Los Angeles. Her approach to teaching is nurturing, accessible and hands-on. She is passionate about sharing her knowledge and having each student leave with the life skills they need to feed themselves well. Marguerita's love of teaching hit its stride as the Edible Schoolyard Director at Larchmont Charter School in Hollywood for 8 years. There she developed a remarkable food education and farm to table lunch program that was true to Alice Water’s vision. As the director, Marguerita strived for the growth in all 3 facets of the Edible Schoolyard program: garden, kitchen & a healthy lunch and their interconnectedness. This is at the foundation of her health coaching as well. The importance of knowing where our food comes from, having foundational skills to feed yourself, and creating a food culture in your life that is mindful and enjoyable. Furthermore, she has concurrently had an extensive career in Hollywood as a private chef to the stars and those with special dietary needs for 25+ years.
Growing up in the heart of the Los Angeles food scene, Forrest has been working in the food industry since her mid-teens, beginning as a passion project to run her own small business baking healthy-nourishing treats, to honing her culinary technique through catering large-scale celebrity events and private-cheffing across SoCal since 2016. Her extensive work and volunteering for Women’s Issues and Neurodiversity have given her a unique lens on coaching clients through varying challenges faced today, and her love for literature and science makes her straight-forward approach perfect for those who like to get straight to the facts. Forrest is a NASM Certified Health and Nutrition Coach, Experienced Plant-Based Chef, and Women’s Walk Group Leader.