From Urban Junk-Food Junkie to Farmer

John Moody

We chat with Kentucky farm educator and homesteader John Moody to learn how a junk-food-eating city kid ended up as a farmer and farm educator.

Moody, who had been heading towards a career in academia so that he could teach, says that in hindsight, “I got a farm so I can teach.”

Food-Buying Club

After a health scare, Moody and his wife began to change their eating habits, buy more whole foods and locally grown foods.

With the change in food buying habits, he noticed that his food bill went way up. “The farmers aren’t getting any of this money I’m spending,” he thought.

That led Moody and his wife to source food directly from farmers and start a food-buying club, Whole Life Buying Club.

Getting into Farming

His interest in growing food evolved out of his interest in healthy food—especially after meeting farmers who were sceptical about cutting their use of external inputs.

So he set out to do it himself.

“I bought a farm, soil not included,” says Moody as he talks about building soil from scratch on a degraded piece of land.

An Outsider’s Perspective

Moody talks about how, on a small farm such as theirs, 30 bottles of specialty elderberry syrup brings in roughly the same amount as what a conventional farmer might get from an acre of corn.