Emma of Bodega Flower Girl on Food, Flowers, and Community

When I first starting following Emma on Instagram, I knew she was a kindred spirit. She was saying things like, “I believe food grown from the ground is important” and posted pictures of Hot Wheels that she sells in her shop. I am a gardener and the mother of a two-year old; she had won me over instantly.

And I know she'll win you over, too.

A few weeks ago, I sat down with Emma to chat about her shop, her culinary background, and flowers, of course!

Nicole: Bodega Flower Girl. The name. Talk to me about it.

Emma: Through my years as a professional hospitality person, whether it's like, front of the house or back of the house or accounting or whatever, mainly has been focused around food. And just especially over the past five, maybe even longer, years there are so many [dietary] restrictions, and people are just like, “I can't do this. I can't do that.” I just feel like flowers are for everyone all the time, regardless of digestion or preference.

And a lot of my practice through my years of just being in this industry of hospitality and restaurants really is visual. I definitely eat or shop or drink with my eyes first. It always kind of goes that way. So, I feel like flowers are kind of like, they draw you in.

The second part, it is a veggie market, so every veggie fruit, flowers. So, there's kind of that correlation, like, connection there.

And then I also really love the process, the cycle of a flower. It's so, so hard to break ground just metaphorically, physically, all the things, and they do it, you know, and it's really inspiring because they're not really getting help from a whole lot of things. If anything, there's more things out there that are not trying to support their growth. So, it's such a powerful thing.

And I do really think that making a mess is really important in creative work. Just in life, like, with kids, you know, it's just a constant mess, and flowers grow in the mess. And I think that's really sweet and powerful and inspiring nonetheless. So, I think I'm just endlessly inspired by the flower.

Nicole: Yeah. I don’t know if I shared this with you when we talked on the phone, but my husband and I used to work at Enterprise Fish Company. That’s where we met. Then he moved up to San Francisco and was expoing, and watching the kitchen guys—that’s how he started to learn more about craft and presentation.

When he moved back down to Santa Barbara and moved in with me, he started garnishing our plates, and it elevated a boring bowl of soup into something more fun.

Sometimes cooking at home can feel a little laborious, especially without a dishwasher and with a kid. But adding edible flowers—like violas I picked from a client’s garden—just elevates the dish. They make food more fun.

So, talk to me about Satellite. How long were you there, and what has been your experience in hospitality and restaurants?

Emma: Yeah, totally. Satellite started when I was working for a wine distributor, selling imported wines to restaurants and wine shops. I met Drew, who was finishing the buildout, and through a mutual friend, I came in to help open.

I came in more like a consultant, but I tend to lead by example, so I was working alongside everyone and training that way. I ended up staying.

At first, we were buying prepared food from a place in the Public Market and reselling it, but it felt inauthentic—selling wine you don’t make and food you don’t make. It also created a lot of waste.

So, I reached out about permits and asked if we could process vegetables—washing lettuces, doing mostly raw preparations. That’s how the food program grew. I was there for a little over eight years, and it evolved a lot over time.

And it just kind of grew from there. And it was really fun. I mean, a whole lot of ups and downs and just like remakes of like identity and kind of growth in that way.

Before that, I worked for the distributor and a small winemaker, Sanguis. My background started after high school when I went to culinary school in San Francisco. That’s where I met my ex-husband and first business partner.

We opened a restaurant called Julienne in 2008. It was dinner-only, five nights a week, tasting menus. It was a small staff—I waited tables, he worked the line. Very mom-and-pop which was nice.

Later we opened a second place, then divorced, and I moved into other roles. Most of my early career was front of house, but I was always around the kitchen—watching, helping with prep, shopping for ingredients.

Satellite was where I really got more hands-on with food. Now I’m kind of a mix—front, back, operations—and the shop reflects that. It’s prepared food, customer relationships, wine, pantry items—things I love to have in my own kitchen.

Nicole: Okay, so you talked a little bit about this, but what are your values for the shop? How do your personal values inform what Bodega stands for?

Emma: I really value our farmers and our local farmer’s market. I think that's probably number one. They have all this responsibility and have to deal with the elements and outside and the birds and all the things—it seems like a huge undertaking.

So, I really do value them and all that work and their consistency; it's really beautiful how consistent they are. Even though we have crazy rains or droughts or whatever just over the years. So, I really do value them and I think that's a huge foundation of what this place is—honoring our local growers.

And that's really the basis, right? It's stuff that comes from the ground.

And I have a lot of imported stuff. A majority of my wine program is imported. I feel like that fits the bill a little bit more. We have so many producers of great local wine and I feel like they're pretty much accessible around the area.

I love, Italian products, French products, European stuff, I think is all really wonderful and not necessarily everywhere. So, kind of diversifying a little bit that way.

But having the basis of all the perishable really being local.

Nicole: And it forces people to get out of their comfort zone and try something new. Like, I'm such a creature of habit, but iff you come into the shop and you don't see what you normally do and you're willing to be adventurous, then it just opens up your world to new things.

Emma: Yeah, totally. And I think a lot of bodegas, just from a little research that I've done, are kind of really based on heritage. It's like, I think, you know, some of the bodegas in New York are really focused, you know, like an Italian bodega or a Jewish market or deli, like, or a Mississippi Middle Eastern. You know, there's all the pretty focused on heritage. So, you know, I've lived a majority of my life here in the Santa Barbara area, so this is it. This is my heritage. This is the ground that supports me every day.

A lot of bodegas are tied to cultural heritage—Italian, Middle Eastern, etc. I’ve lived a majority of my life here in the Santa Barbara area, so this is it. This is my heritage. This is the ground that supports me every day.

Nicole: Do you have a garden? What value do you see in people having a garden?

Emma: I have a piece of dirt at my house in our front yard. It's pretty shaded but I have planted flowers over the years and I do see a lot of value in it. I tend to find a lot of like great mental self-help work in the garden. Just by kind of tending to the ground and turning the ground over it’s so exhausting physically I can't really think of anything else. So, I think that's really healthy and really good for your mental health to actually like tend to the ground and turn it over and take care of it and try your best to grow something from seed and be okay with whatever the outcome is and kind of show accountability, responsibility to the place that supports us every day.

Nicole: Do you have a favorite flower?

Emma: I love edible flowers—borage is one of my favorites. It’s really vibrant and kind of unreal looking. I also love chamomile and feverfew, but it changes with the seasons.

Nicole: What do you hope people take away from the workshop?

Emma: Comfortability and confidence. Just going with the flow.

I always say “listen to the ingredients.” If you pay attention visually, they kind of tell you what to do.

I want people to feel a sense of release and to enjoy the process. Whether they’re nourishing themselves or someone else, there’s something special in that.

You can find Bodega Flower Girl in Sevilla Square on the corner of State and Gutierrez (19 W. Gutierrez).