Hey all,
In my recent post about popcorn kernels, I had a comment suggest that I could also just put the leftover kernels or stale popcorn to use for compost.
This has been something I’ve been thinking of for a while now. Guilty as charged, I’ve let good food spoil in my fridge while I’ve been figuring out what to do with it. While this has been getting better as I’ve been learning more vegan substitutions as I’m new to being vegan, as well as home cooking in general, I don’t want to throw my food waste in with the garbage as I have been doing for eons now when situations arise where something spoils on me.
My issue is that, while I was taught how composting works in school, they only ever taught us how to do so if we lived in a detached home that had a backyard. I have always lived in apartment buildings, and currently am living on a second floor apartment unit. While my city does allow for people to separate food waste from other garbage and recycling, and even encourages it, my current building does not have a designated area for food waste.
What options are available to me when it comes to disposing of food waste so that in the end, my waste isn’t quite “waste”? I should also likely add that I live in an area with a colder climate where winter (which is coming up soon here) often hits -30 C.
Thanks in advance!
In my region we get a compost bin from the city. A special dump truck collects it for composting.
However, I have seen people using composters on their rooftop gardens. It kinda looked like a bbq grill, but with a big wheel on one side to flip it. That could be for you, if you have rooftop access.
Unfortunately not, but we do have a community garden on the property grounds. I can try to find someone familiar with it and ask them.
Many community gardens have a compost bin that the community is welcome to use. Might be worth looking into.
You could do worms, it’s easy to get started and I think low enough smell you could keep them indoors.
https://learn.eartheasy.com/articles/worm-composting-basics-for-beginners/
Might be a hard sell to the landlord honestly, but I can ask them if that’s an option available regardless.
It’s just a bin in your kitchen.
With worms though? Wouldn’t they see that as a potential pest attractor?
Not if you’re doing it right. Worms should eat things before flies have a chance. The air holes are too small for mice or anything.
Whatever you do, do not buy those electrical/smart Kitchen compossters you can find online. They are extremely energy intensive and isn’t really compsoting anything anyway. It just dries and grinds the content into paste/powder that they claim is compost but it is not all while using a lot of unnecessary energy.
Try your local community garden compost instead as i saw you wrote about in another comment.
Do you have a balcony?
I freeze my scraps until I have enough to make vegetable or chicken broth/stock, and then after the broth I have a vermipost bin (worm bin) on my balcony. Since I’m in an apartment by myself, this is the easiest way. I give the worm tea and castings to my sister if I’ll be visiting her or to the community garden since there’s not enough light on my balcony to grow anything. This is my first time living somewhere with winter (I previously lived in warmer climates), so I did need to bring my worms in for the winter so they didn’t freeze (of you have extra space in a utility closet that could be a spot), and there was no smell as other had mentioned, as long as you don’t overwhelm them the worms do a good job of processing everything in a timely manner. Giving them crushed eggshells and coffee grounds really helps with this as well.
I’ve known friends that made a countertop sized worm bin with less worms and had no problem with it right in the kitchen of their small apartment.
I live in a small flat too. Usually, I put my compost in a big plastic bucket with holes underneath, then hang it outside the window. Bring it indoor when it’s freezing outside. I also use a relatively big pot, put it beside my other plants on a window shelf. But I only put in normal garden wastes and a small amount of fresh kitchen waste, as the spaces really weren’t enough, they already take at least a year to decompose. Not sure if it’s doable for you?
Edit: They don’t smell if they decompose right.
Food waste actually doesn’t smell if it’s kept dry. Put solid food waste, semi-dry coffee grounds, and oily paper towels into paper bags on an airy bag holder, and it should be fine for a few days to a week without any smells or flies.
This doesn’t work for rotten food and larger amounts of raw meat, though. Those must be thrown directly into compost or trash.
Make sure to keep it airy and dry, and use paper towels to absorb any extra liquids. If you let them sog up in a sealed bin, then they get gross.
The resulting bags can be rolled up and closed and shouldn’t leak. You can use a plastic bag to be doubly sure if you’re taking them onto a bus. The bags can then be thrown into compost. in Sweden, they’re centrally collected to put into biogas reactors.
That is a very good question. I too want to know. But also you need any escape for that compost. Do you have roof garden or balcony?
No roof garden or balcony, but we do have a small garden on the property outside by the corner where the road turns.
If you can improve the soil there that’s seems like a good plan. I would go with a sealable container maybe those boxes that have a latch. But I imagine everytime it opens the smell won’t be very nice
An acquaintance of mine by the name of Mark Follansbee runs “Wormainea” and teaches folks to do worm bins (vermiculture) in the southern parts of Maine. He’s got a few different guides, whether you prefer videos or written instructions, but I’ve gotten to dig into his setups and they’re pretty easy to set up and keep going - and there’s practically no smell (done right). You’ll have to find something to do with the castings and the worms once the population hits a point.
I still exploring the option that fit my specific lifestyle with many contraint including living the appartement with not access to a close composting post and here are the
twothree options that I find interesting :- Freezing your waste until a not-so-frequent trip to the composting site further away. You need a freezer with enough space.
- Do vermicomposting. It is basically raising worm inside a specifically shape compost bin. They eat your waste quickly so there is no smell and can live inside. But they don’t eat meat waste.
- Do Bokashi. It is not an actual composting method but an anaerobic fermentation method. No smell, no bug, ni rotten attracted. But you have to have two bins to rotated them, filling one as the other ferment. The ferment result will turn into dirt buried in a (big) pot in just three week. Alternatively, you can feed it your worm or a classic compost ; it will boost them. You’ll need to buy a fermentation starter and not to put rotten or moldy food to not change the bacteria working. Later, you’ll use already fermented Bokashi to start the next batch.
Someone else suggested going to a composting site, but freezing the waste wasn’t mentioned. This seems like a step in the right direction, but still worried about it thawing during the trip and the wastewater leaking through the bag, causing a mess and disturbing other bus passengers with the smell.
Never had it happen with waste bags, but I’ve seen a few times where people (my family included growing up) would bring in bagged bottles and cans to return for bottle deposit, and the bus drivers were never pleased when the bags leaked.
Could you maybe use a bucket to transport it? Something with a resealable lid? This way, no liquid or unpleasant smells can escape the container
If your freeze your waste right away you will not get much smell, nothing more that what you got when it was “fresh”. But yeah leaking liquid migh be an issue. You know better that anyone else if this solution can fit your lifestyle.
You should check to see if your city, county, (or however you handle local government demarcation) has a composting program of some kind.
I live in an apartment and I’m able to drop off my compost at designated composting spots provided by the city on the weekend.
You may also have a composting organization or a local community garden that composts that will happily take your scraps to add to their larger composting pile.
My main concern with that option is transport. Since I don’t drive and don’t plan on getting a license, I’d likely have to take the bus, and I would hate to disturb others with the smell of rotten food and/or food scraps.
That’s a fair concern, but if you keep it in a sealed plastic bin (a 5 qt is enough for 2 people for 1-2 weeks in my experience) you shouldn’t have any odor issues. We store ours in the fridge because there’s not enough room in the freezer, but if you have more freezer space than fridge this should be doubly true since all the food scraps will be frozen until you drop them off.
I only have to carry mine to the bins provided by the city outside my apartment, but shoving it in a bag or backpack would be doable if it’s worth it to you.
There are compostable bags you can buy (Amazon warning). My county organics recycling program gives out ones that are very similar to the linked, they work quite well. They do tend to fall apart if you leave them too long, but as long as they’ve sealed there’s no smell. Keep in mind I’m going on a weekly basis, and just collecting food scraps/napkins/etc. I don’t bother with soil etc.
If you gradually put in vegetable wasts, cardboard paper, and maybe some soil, keep them airy and moist, and turn them often, in the worst case they only have a little bit unpleasant smell in the beginning. One of my compost pot is mostly indoor, it has a smell, but it’s a pleasant smell.
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