Got Dirt? — Angela Flotken

Have you ever thought about composting? I hadn’t either until a few years ago when I realized how easy it was and how much waste I could save from the landfills. Why should you give a fuck? Because our food scraps make up around a third of what we throw away, and keeping that waste out of landfills frees up space and lowers the release of methane (a greenhouse gas). Add to that the fact that food scraps really aren’t waste at all! They are awesome, nutrient rich material that can be used to help your plants grow. Compost will lock moisture in the soil, keep away diseases and pests, reduce the need for chemical fertilizers and encourage beneficial bacteria. In a nutshell, it’s food for your garden.

Since we are mostly plant-based over here, we go through an enormous amount of compostable food scraps. When we re-did our kitchen I insisted on building out a compartment under our sink where we could house a great little compost bin like this. There I would collect food scraps.

Then, we bought the mother of all outdoor compost bins (sort of like this one) which took no less than 2386 hours for my husband to put together. He was really loving me during this time (see exhibit A). When he finally finished, we stood in awe of the greatness. Even if our compost was shit, our process was on point.

About a year and a half has gone by. I have saved hundreds of pounds of waste from our landfills. My biceps have grown bigger and stronger from turning our compost bin. And nothing makes me feel more green than when I march from my indoor bin to my outdoor bin with my little bag of waste. But guess what… my compost is shit.

Until a few weeks ago I honestly didn’t care. I figured my garden was growing so amazingly well (wink, wink) that I really didn’t need to add anything to it. So what if my compost sucks, I am saving the world and the world is more important than my compost being perfectly perfect. One day once I figured out the right ratio of green to brown I would open the bin and my perfect mixture would appear. That was my story and I was sticking to it.

But the following text from a friend change it all. For sake of anonymity, let’s just call my friend “Betty.”

About a year and a half has gone by. I have saved hundreds of pounds of waste from our landfills. My biceps have grown bigger and stronger from turning our compost bin. And nothing makes me feel more green than when I march from my indoor bin to my outdoor bin with my little bag of waste. But guess what… my compost is shit.

Until a few weeks ago I honestly didn’t care. I figured my garden was growing so amazingly well (wink, wink) that I really didn’t need to add anything to it. So what if my compost sucks, I am saving the world and the world is more important than my compost being perfectly perfect. One day once I figured out the right ratio of green to brown I would open the bin and my perfect mixture would appear. That was my story and I was sticking to it.

But the following text from a friend change it all. For sake of anonymity, let’s just call my friend “Betty.”

I spent a few minutes looking at the web site and price tag and quickly decided my gloppy sub-par compost was just fine. I wasn’t going to spend $350 on something I didn’t need.

A little while later that little person on my shoulder showed up and said “don’t you want to just try it?” “Wouldn’t it be kinda cool if it worked?” “Don’t you want to share this information with your friends?” And just like that, guess what just showed up on my doorstep a few days ago? My husband was once again pumped…or something.

At first inspection I was intimidated. For someone who wants nothing more than a kitchen without clutter I wasn’t quite sure where this thing would go. I hadn’t planned for this to be a part of our space…and this life changer isn’t exactly small. But, I needed to take one for the team (that’s you guys – you’re my team) so I unboxed the thing and got rockin’.

The FoodCyler promised to deliver odorless, ready to use fertilizer in an energy-efficient way in less than three hours… and I was counting on it. It seemed too good to be true when traditional compost can take weeks or months to create. But, I am here to tell you this thing actually works. The process is really simple. You fill the container with food waste, lock the top into place, and press the start button. The machine is quiet, it’s easy, it shuts itself off… and the end result is a soil amendment I can take right outside and shake onto my garden. Oh, and there is NO ASSEMBLY REQUIRED. If you factor in what you might spend for a nice indoor and outdoor compost bin and compostable bags – the cost difference isn’t far off.