Compost in the City

Over the course of Bon Appétit's Project Recipe—cooking my way through their top 100 dishes—I have learned a lot of things. I've learned about flavor profiles—I now speak, albeit somewhat haltingly, the language of cooking. I've learned some knife skills, nothing fancy, but a julienne here and there. And I've learned that I produce a lot of organic waste. Even when I do my best to incorporate all aspects of a vegetable (cooking the beet and the beet greens for example) I end up with some left over. Carrot peels, for example, have nowhere to go but the trash.

I should be composting. Deep in my heart I've known that all along.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency defines "compost" as organic material that can be used as a soil amendment or as a medium to grow plants. In plain English, that means coffee grounds, nut shells, tea bags, fruits, ashes, lint, and other things that can be smushed into piles on top of soil to save our planet (here's a full list of what should be composted and what should not).

The truth is, I know how to compost. Tree People was my favorite field trip in elementary school, outpacing the children's museum and the sewage treatment plant, so I've known what it is and how to do it since 5th grade.

So what's the hold up? I live in an apartment. One that is devoid of outdoor space. We have houseplants; an enormous amaryllis and a withering orchid... In New York one could drop off one's organic scraps at community gardens. The same opportunity does not exist in L.A. I have done some Internet research and weighed my options:

1. Give my scraps to a neighbor with a yard who composts. I certainly would, but it turns out that they would be committing a crime. In L.A., it is illegal to compost things not generated on site. You would think it wouldn't matter, but people have been fined for it. A local "farmer" (she has a lot, not a plot) was collecting vegetable scraps from a restaurant and composting when her neighbors complained. (The restaurant in question, Canele, is one of my favorites.)

2. VERMICOMPOSTING! That's composting with worms. The city of Los Angeles has an excellent explanation of this in their guide to composting. My Latin is rusty so I first thought, "Hmm. I must use vermin to compost." Although I have nothing explicitly against worms, I am not interested in them being in my kitchen (again, no outdoor space). I could ask my landlord if I could have a worm bin by the trashcans. He might indulge me. But, this method can be slow moving (worms have small digestive tracts). And, much like humans, you have to change their bedding occasionally. If I was doing the some old-fashioned pile composting I'd totally throw some worms in, I'm just not sure about a worm bin under the sink.

4. Then there is the Nature Mill—an automatic indoor composter that mixes, heats, and aerates food waste, turning it into rich soil. It seems like the answer to an apartment composter's prayers—I could donate this rich soil to neighbors or a garden without breaking the law. But, at $300, it's not exactly in my budget.

I think my best bet is a polite inquiry to my landlord about putting a bin by the trash cans and inviting my neighbors to join me. There are some lawns near by, I'm sure they'd appreciate the soil.

Bridget Moloney is an actress, writer, novice home cook, and blogger for Bon Appétit.

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Comments

[spacester]

rblackbird:
"Decomposing organic matter gives off co2. When compost is given to plants, the added co2 increases their growth. A great result, but how does having a compost pile reduce your carbon footprint?"

My understanding is that a large amount of the carbon that would've been emitted as CO2 if burnt - or otherwise not returned to the soil - is captured in the compost product, whether done by worms or not. It would seem that the worm method would be really good at it (capturing carbon), but I haven't run across any numbers on this yet. I'll see what I can find. So it would be organic carbon that would get "fed" to the plants (in the form of 'humus' IINM), the CO2 they get from the atmosphere. No shortage there, sadly. :-)

[rblackbird]

Decomposing organic matter gives off co2. When compost is given to plants, the added co2 increases their growth. A great result, but how does having a compost pile reduce your carbon footprint?

[Organic-Guy]

You should petition the city to have curbside pick up of organic waste and start a major composting project for the city. In the long run it's much less expensive to do that than to landfill all that waste. The compost can be made free to city residents for their gardens and lawns and what's left over can be used for city gardens and landscapes.

It's already being done in Burlington, Vermont and many other places across the country. In Middlebury, Vermont we have the Moo-Doo factory (a private company) which generates electricity from the methane composting produces in their co-generator and then they bag and sell the finished product. They even compost the glycerine from the biodiesel plant in Winooski, Vt.. Blue Spruce Farm in Bridport, Vermont composts it's manure from the dairy cows and uses the methane in a co-generator and sells the excess electricity to the local power grid.
The cost of starting the program can be offset by the free organic fertilizer and electricity made by the city and pumped into the grid. Curbside pickup is the place to start. My company, Dirt Works, sells the kitchen compost bins and biodegradable bags for this type of thing.

LaLa land usually starts the trends in this country. Why so far behind the curve on this one? Maybe LA could use some of the stimulus money it will receive to get this going. It can create lots of jobs and clean up the environment too.

[spacester]

Wow, thanks for the info. I was wondering if any cities were collecting the food waste for composting. Good for you, Vermont! I have some googling to do.

[shusnacks]

We have been vermicomposting for about six months now. My three year old daughter loves to feed the worms! I think it is pretty cool too. We don't really have a problem with it. The worms stay in the container where they munch away. We have found that the more worms you have the faster the scraps are consumed. We live in L.A. so we have to bring the worms in when the weather gets too hot otherwise we keep it on the balcony. We will be adding our new soil to our little flower strip this next planting season.

[spacester]

Thanks for the nice article and links. I've been researching vermicomposting lately: I'm trying to understand why it isn't more popular. I don't want to draw conclusions too early, but one hypothesis is the 'eeyeew' factor. In my opinion, you should get a nice looking worm factory and find a spot for it: it doesn't have to be in the kitchen. And then you could write a nice follow-up article about how you got over your squeamishness. :-) That would run you about $100 including worms. I'm building a worm box right now out of a single sheet of 1/2" plywood, I'm trying to design a nice $50 max do-it-yourself option including worms that folks can get from their local Home Depot / Lowes - have them make the major cuts, you'll need a saw and cordless screwdriver and a few other common tools. I'll post the plans elsewhere for free download when I'm done.