Baker’s Dozen / Emma Jagoz of Moon Valley Farm

When I started this series, I knew I wanted to feature Emma Jagoz of Moon Valley Farm. In the often overwhelming world of social media, Emma’s posts are a breath of fresh air for me. She informs, she inspires and she just plain shines. Emma is a mom, a farmer, a small business owner and an advocate for farmers, always teaching the people she encounters. In addition to the actual farming, she wears a lot of hats – engineer, scientist and marketing professional to name a few. And, Emma has a very talented and hardworking team who make so much happen and I love when she highlights them on social media.

I highly recommend following Moon Valley on Facebook or Instagram, or signing up for their newsletter. You will learn a lot and also be inspired to eat locally grown foods, cook with new ingredients and more. Moon Valley has a very active and, might I add, organized and efficient CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program and they deliver weekly to Baltimore. In addition to a vegetable CSA (you can also add things like eggs, mushrooms, bread, etc) they are doing a fruit CSA this year. I can attest to the freshness of the produce, since I just did two months of weekly deliveries. They were always on schedule and I received a text when my box was dropped off. You can swap out items and pause your subscription anytime. I think the fruit CSA is going to be very popular, not too many farms offer that. And, just FYI: Emma started farming on ½ an acre in 2012 and they had 12 CSA members – now, they have 600 members and are farming on 70 acres. Wow. 

I love this, just read it on Moon Valley’s Facebook page: Through a $12,000 grant from the Maryland Food and Agriculture Resiliency Mechanism Grant Program, the Enoch Pratt Free Library is launching the Enoch Pratt Free Library Community Refrigerators project. The project aims to distribute 2,000 pounds of food each month in three locations – Brooklyn, Orleans Street, and Pennsylvania Avenue. Moon Valley Farm will deliver fresh produce to these locations, and the library staff and volunteers will organize distribution to library customers and the community. The program will be available on a first-come, first-served basis until it runs out each week, reaching approximately 500 individuals each month.

Be sure to save Saturday, May 18 for Moon Valley’s first ever Strawberry Festival. They are growing certified organic strawberries this year and the festival will feature pick-your-own strawberries, farm tours and more. Stay tuned via social media for more details.

I am so happy to share Emma’s answers to my Baker’s Dozen questions. I hope you enjoy them, I sure did.

Cake or Pie? And what kind?

This is hard for me as both are clearly delicious but I’ll go with cake. I like a good coffee cake with a thick crumble with homemade jam swirled into the batter — served with coffee!

Your most prized possession?

Sentimental family things – a small gold necklace made from my grandmothers jewelry melted down that everyone in my family got a piece of after she passed; a gorgeous wall hanging quilt of sunflowers that my mom made me, my sister’s woodblock prints that are featured all around my house, my other sister’s pottery, especially the full size fermentation crock she made me, the bed frame my brother and brother-in-law made for me after my divorce, my daughter’s drawings.

What’s your favorite thing to order out at restaurants?

Tom kha soup – Thai food is so delicious!

What’s your favorite to cook at home?

Onions and mushrooms. Easily goes with anything I’m having – or steals the show! – so simple and so so good.

What’s your morning beverage and how do you take it?

French press coffee with a splash of oat milk.

What’s your personal motto?

I have so many – I’m a real self help nerd. Don’t believe everything that you think. “Do one thing every day that scares you.” (Not a direct quote but from Eleanor Roosevelt.) “Your willingness to be uncomfortable is in direct proportion to creating what you really want.” (Brooke Castillo) Those are a few that come to mind. I love mottos, mantras, little sentences of encouragement that help me grow, and I update those that I keep top of mind as I absorb them and find new challenges.

What’s your favorite holiday and why?

I love the winter solstice. It’s quiet and reflective and a real marker of time for me as a farmer. Because it’s the darkest day of the year the crops we’re harvesting are limited so it feels like this lovely pause – a rare opportunity for stillness before the switching back to more and more light and an opportunity to reflect on the entire past growing season.

Best advice you were ever given? And from whom?

I’ll go with a quote from Mary Oliver, “You must not ever stop being whimsical. And you must not, ever, give anyone else the responsibility for your life.”

What do you feel is your greatest accomplishment?

Taking the scary leap – time and time again – to pursue my dream of raising my kids alongside building a business that models for them empowerment, independence, food security, land stewardship and collaboration. Growing Moon Valley Farm from a small seed of an idea to a thriving business while centering the needs of my kids the whole time is something I’ll always be proud of.

The last text you sent?

‘”Do your math homework!” to my daughter (as I’m not home at the moment).

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Unlearning, making mistakes, learning and growing with the safety and support and love of my incredible community: my boyfriend, our kids, our families and our friends. I’m already living it! (A lot.)

What do you love most about food?

I love food’s capacity to cultivate community and connection. Sharing food can be vulnerable, satisfying, raw, kind, so fun and oh so human. Food has the power to make our differences feel less important and the connection we have to each other stronger.

What’s your favorite place in Baltimore?

I love Peabody because I spent years playing flute there and I especially loved when Red Emma’s was right around the corner too for some amazing books, people and food/drinks.

Baker’s Dozen is an occasional column highlighting some very talented, hardworking and kind folks in the Baltimore food + beverage community. I hope you will make a point to support their businesses.