Amazing Things About Kitchen Composting

In the very back corner of our yard is 'Compost Central'.  Its not even noticeable unless you walk all the way back to it.  For years it was just your average outdoor collection of leaves, grass, sawdust and wood chips…yeah, kind of boring. Somewhere along the way the tomatoes and vegetables we were growing got tossed in when they got overripe on the vine or had been munched on by various critters. A light bulb went off and I was asking myself 'what about tossing in the overripe things in the fridge…?'. Yes - I researched it. Turns out half the contents of our fridge qualified as compost. Our first kitchen compost pail was a bright orange  plastic, five gallon, lidded bucket (advertising a very familiar big-box store).

 The first thing I went through was the fridge… I had never had so much fun cleaning out our refrigerator! Next I tackled the food pantry. Turns out half the cereal was expired and could go in the bin. The old pasta, stale cookies, flour.  It all went in the pail and I didn't have that guilty-of-wasting-food moment. Being able to throw coffee grounds and the filter in every morning instead of. We found out fast that this practice of kitchen composting was cutting out half the garbage we were bagging up and hauling outside. Not wasting anything and cutting garbage in half! The kitchen compost being dumped to the main compost pile kind of completed the cycle…for a while. We had fabulous, rich, wormy, compost to to add to he gardens.

Brown Gold

 With every harvest we can tell by taste of the food we grow and the look that this compost, as someone else described it, brown gold. No buying fertilizers or soil additives. Free brown gold and less garbage to haul out!

From A Simple DIY Style

Any Color

Stainless Steel

Our original kitchen compost pail has been replace by a nice one gallon, stainless steel, lidded pail -designed just right for the job. The five gallon plastic one sits outside and handles any overflow that can't be taken directly to the compost pile. 

 

Decorative

Now that we have chickens the dynamics have changed completely. The chickens eat a lot of the leftovers from the gardens. That gets distributed back into their bedding in the form of chicken poop and that gets cleaned out and hauled to the compost. Which gets turn and moved and turned till it's ready to go into the gardens again. The recycle cycle coming full circle



Things you CAN compost

• Vegetable and fruit wastes, even moldy and ugly rinds, cores and pits.

• Old bread, donuts, cookies, crackers, pizza crust, noodles: anything made out of flour!

• Grains (cooked or uncooked): rice, barley, oats, etc.

• Coffee grounds, tea bags, filters - yes even the filters!

• Fruit or vegetable pulp from juicing.

• Old herbs and spices.

• Outdated boxed foods from the pantry, cereal - (this was my favorite to take care of)!

• Egg shells  - just crush them first they break down faster - (soon we will have a lot more egg shells to add back)!

• Corn cobs and husks - but cobs breakdown slowly.

• Newspapers except for the slicks or tabloid style, the inks can cause problems to your compost pile.

• Small amounts of paper added a little at a time is better than large amounts.  It doesn’t break down quickly enough if you add to much.

Things you CAN NOT compost:

• Meat or meat waste, such as bones, fat, gristle, skin, etc.

• Fish or fish waste

• Dairy products, such as cheese, butter, cottage cheese, yogurt, cream cheese, sour cream, etc.

• Grease and oils of any kind

Most of these are not acceptable because they break down to slowly, attract rodents and cause your compost to smell.

No matter what your compost consists of you have to get out there and turn it so it will break down faster!

Liz-

Leaves...A Little D.I.Y. On Mulching Not Bagging

 Fall time will be approaching soon and the leaves will be falling.

So your yard is full of leaves now. The natural thing is to just let them lay their and decompose. However the social pecking order of the neighborhood would look down on you as being lazy and call the city on you for degrading the hood.



 


You give in and drag your rake and bags out and start bagging. It came to me about 30 years ago that I am throwing away valuable compost. I used to get a magazine back in the late 70's called "New Shelter" that showed every year what to do with those leaves. So I have been doing this when I can since then.

So I say "Make Mulch, Not Bags" Besides you save money by not buying 50 bags or more, you don't fill up the land fill, and you have free mulch in the Spring.











It takes a little work but its better than trying to keep that bag upright as you stuff it full of leaves.

First you need some leaves. Its best to do this when the leaves are nice and dry.

I rake my leaves to my driveway or sidewalk into a long pile. A flat surface helps. If you are not near a hard surface, just a flat area will work in the yard.

This is when I pull out my 30+ year old electric lawnmower and start running over the leaves. Always think safety when you are using power tools. A lot of mowers can be set to be used in the mulching mode by covering the exit where material is thrown out. My mower has a flap in the back where the bag attachment goes. Of course you can use gas mowers however I like my electric mower because of no CO2. cheap fuel cost, and a lot easier to start. Just don't run over the cord.

They do make upright Mulchers/Chippers and I had one, but I spent more time unclogging it than mulching leaves. Being somewhat lazy, I found running over the leaves with the mower was simply easier and had the same result.  Keep running over all the piles until the leaves are chopped up fine. You may ask, why do you want to bother chopping the leaves up?  First it reduces the volume by half. Second, it helps speed up the decomposing process.

I rake up the chopped leaves back into piles and transfer them to the wheel barrel for a trip to the compose pile.

There are all different ways to make compost piles however that is another blog discussion. A short description of ours is that I have a two piles, old and new. The chopped leaves go into the new. In addition, all kitchen compost scraps, chicken poop, etc. go into the new. The key is rotating the pile every few weeks with a fork to keep it fluffed up and allow air to flow through. As it gets dark and finer, I then transfer it to the older pile.

In the Spring, new mulch goes into the garden. I mix it in with the dirt. In regards to proportion, it is usually 25% mulch and 75% existing dirt mixed well. I do not know the science behind this claim but it seems to make the plants happy. We tried to use mulchonly one time but did not have as good of results.

The rewarding part is eating healthy food from the garden that you made the soil richer by chopping up a few leaves. I think that is what they mean by big words like sustainability.

Also sharing food with the neighbors will raise your level in the pecking order.



Harry

Oh, The Cost Of Potting Soil

We have been composting for years - which is how this whole 'recycle-cycle' thing got started.  Grass cuttings, raked leaves, sawdust and wood shavings wood, a few small limbs and twigs to break up--and it all goes to the compost. No buying bags to fill and haul to the street (more about perk later). Just a reusable round pop-up style garden bin that is easy to fill (no bags to stuff and tie off at top).   Just carry the whole thing to the compost pile and dump. Seriously. Easy.

I've always had container gardens over-flowing with flowers, herbs, and vegetables. I love them because they're like portable color and texture for the yard.  I can experiment with them in sunny or shady locations, find out what works best. Years ago, as I would start over with a container, I would throw out the old plants with their dirt and not think a thing of it. Now I look back and cringe at the thought of all that was wasted. Yeah, yeah, it was just dirt but have you seen the cost of potting soil lately? I never buy potting soil anymore.  I take what I call healthy, but just worn out soil and mix it in a large pail with our rich wormy compost and that's all I need to plant or replant for the season (I guess that could be called recycling the compost or re-purposing the compost...). We started kitchen composting (more info about kitchen composting to come) and that upped the pile considerably.  All the sawdust from building the coop will go to the compost pile. Eventually the bedding and poop from the chicken coop will go into the compost pile! The recycle-cycle.

Edibles Growing Very Well

Carrots

So many great ideas for growing vegetables in small areas can be found on the Internet!

Re-purposed Dump Truck

Just research what you're planting and give it the proper care......you can grow almost anything almost anywhere!

Used Pallets

A Full Vegetable Garden And No Big Red Tractor In Sight!

Liz-

The Recycle Cycle

What we've been doing for a long time....
The Recycle Cycle: Throw leftovers from meals into 1 gal. kitchen compost bin...dump kitchen bin into 5 gal. pail outside…dump 5 gal. pail to main (outdoor) compost pile…the bedding and poop from cleaning your chicken coop can also be dumped into the main compost pile...let it breakdown into organic material to become compost...haul loads and loads of rich, organic compost to your garden...grow your own great veggies...harvest veggies, collect eggs from your own backyard...make fabulous healthy meals...eat well...scrape the compostable leftovers in to kitchen compost bin...repeat. A lot.

Great Compost!

For Larger Composts This Style Is Easy For Turning Layers

There are so many different ways to build and start a compost pile or bin. Find ideas/plans on the Internet, get ideas from what you neighbors have. It can be basic, simple or fancy depending on your needs. You can also buy manufactured compost bins in every shape and style. Do your research first though!

Nicely Hidden!

Easy Open Front

Note!  No matter which style of composting you choose you need to know the basic composting process before you start!!!!!!! There will be many more posts in this blog devoted entirely to composting and Kitchen composting !


Liz-