Now that it's April, it seems like an appropriate time to get started on one of my New Year's resolutions: composting.
When I was growing up, I remember my mom and my brother researching together and buying a huge outdoor composter that still resides next to my parents' house. It was big and black and caught the sun very well, and the heat would help turn our kitchen scraps into black gold (don't you think that's a better term for talking about compost than oil?). It produced such healthy compost that one summer they discovered a giant tomato plant had emerged from underneath the composter and was thriving better than anything in the garden!
I've kind of half-assed composting as an adult. I know exactly how important it is to utilize what would otherwise be wasted, especially with our own summer vegetable garden, but after then-puppy Samson chewed up our first compost container years ago, I lost motivation a little bit. Throwing out our scraps while knowing they could be going to a better purpose got to me, though. I was happy when Uncommon Goods offered to send me a product to review, and right away I picked the All Seasons Indoor Kitchen Composter. (As an aside, I'm proud to partner with this company and I love the food-related non-profit work Uncommon Goods does, like running City Harvest, which strives to end hunger in communities throughout New York City through food rescue, distribution, and education.)
And now, without further ado, and because I know you're waiting for it, here is a picture of our garbage.
Beautiful, right? Well, I think it's beautiful. (Sidenote: Dear all of our eggs, I'm sorry it took me so many tries to get that macaron recipe right.)
I wanted to try this composter in particular because you don't have to restrict what you put in -- it can handle meat, fish, bones, and dairy in addition to the typical fruit and vegetable fare -- and the whole composting process takes place right in your kitchen thanks to the addition of bokashi (a mix of microorganisms that help decrease smell and ferment the waste). The bokashi itself smells very strong, but once it started its hard work of breaking down the first round of food scraps, the odor dissipated almost completely.
This whole circle-of-life thing taking place right on our kitchen floor is definitely new. When we composted in the past, we mainly just separated the fruits and vegetables and then our trash pick-up service would take the scraps away to be composted elsewhere. It's cool to think that we're the ones who are going to benefitting from this in a few short months! Oh yeah, and it's sturdy enough to stand up to Samson. Check out more gardening products here.
*Thank you Uncommon Goods for letting me choose such a cool product to try out and review. All opinions are my own.