Home Composting for Beginners: How to Compost Food Scraps at Home for Organic Gardening

If you knew how much food people waste every day, you would be stunned. People throw away leftovers and other inedible parts of food items—banana peels, onion peels, eggshells, and etcetera. Home composting is one best way of ensuring food is not wasted.

Benefits of Home Composting 

• Create compost fertilizer for your garden that is organic. Compost is very nutritious to the plants; good bacteria and fungi help create humus. Humus is a substance of decayed matter that provides nutrients for plants and promotes water retention in the soil.
• Compost enriches the soil and reduces the possibility of pests and diseases.
• Help fight climate change by keeping food out of landfills and thus reducing your carbon footprint. 

What Food Scraps Go to Compost 

All vegetables and fruits: It could be pineapple tops, potato peels, carrot tops, or even rotten fruits. I also compost cooked vegetables and coffee grounds (minus the coffee filters). Add fresh coffee grounds can to plants that prefer acidic soil, such as blackberries. Coffee grounds are acidic and help with water drainage.

Meats and dairy: Scraps from all meats are compostable. These include eggshells and cooked meats. For plants that need calcium (like tomatoes, lettuce, and peppers), you can put crushed eggshells around the plant.

What I Don’t Compost 

Teabags and coffee filters: This is because so many companies use plastic material to make these tea bags and coffee filters. Even though they don’t look plastic at all. Only a few companies use compostable tea bags.

I also don’t compost bones from meats as they don’t disintegrate by the time the compost is ready for use. 

I take care before composting food bags that say “compostable”. Most of these bags are only compostable in specific conditions that can only be achieved at an industrial facility rather than at home. But, there are some “compostable bags” that you can compost at home and usually, the manufacturer will state on the bag. 

Read this short article on composting at home by the United States Environmental Protection Agency. It talks about what to compost and what not to compost (and reasons) and decide what you will do. They advise that you don’t compost things like meat scraps because of the odor that might attract rodents and flies.

I compost meat scraps because my compost bin shuts tight and doesn’t produce a smell when closed. But, I can imagine if you are composting in an open pile or open box, you might have a problem. 

How to Store Food Scraps Before Taking them Outside (Kitchen Composting)

Find a good small container or buy a kitchen compost bin that can close tight to keep away the smell. Some store the food scraps’ bin in the kitchen for 2 or 3 days before moving it to a big compost bin or pile outside. Some keep the food inside longer if they have very good tins. You will decide depending on what works for you. 

I use my old coffee tin as my kitchen compost bin. It’s the Folgers red plastic tin for their classic roast ground coffee. I have both medium and large tins and they work for me because they shut tight and don’t produce a smell.  

Some people keep their food scraps container in the refrigerator to slow down the decomposing process. I prefer to take the compost out after every three days or so. This works for me because I don’t cook as much during the week so we don’t have a lot of cooked food scraps. 

How to Compost Outside 

The easiest way to compost is to focus on layering—one layer for “greens” and one layer for “browns”. 

What’s considered to be “greens”?

• Vegetable scraps
• Fruits scraps
• Meat and egg scraps
• Coffee grounds 
• Flowers 
• Fresh grass
• Shrubs
• Fresh leaves

What’s considered to be “browns”?

• Dried leaves
• Dried grass
• Dried trees 
• Straw
• Cardboards

“Greens” are rich in nitrogen (including meats), while “browns” are rich in carbon. Newspapers fall under “browns” and are compostable. But, I choose not to compost newspapers because I don’t want chemicals, that may come from ink, in my soil.  

Beside “green” and “brown”, you all need to add water when layering. Water encourages compost development.

How to Layer When Home Composting 

Try to layer equal amounts of “green” and “brown”. For example, aim for two inches of food scraps and green leaves, and two inches of dried leaves/dried grass. Continue this kind of layering until you run out of food scraps. 

Where to Compost Outside 

There are a few ways you can compost depending on what your preference is and how much space you have outside. Remember, when you follow composting instructions your compost should not smell. But, odor will be there now and again, especially when you are turning the compost or adding fresh layers. Try to find an open space not too close to walls, doors, and windows. 

Worms and maggots will be a part of the composting cycle—don’t worry, they are very good for composting. Worms speed up the breaking down of the waste. When a Black Soldier Fly (BSF) lays eggs in the compost, the eggs produce larvae.

A Compost Tumbler Bin is Best for Home Composting 

You can buy a compost tumbler bin from home and garden shops like Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, and Amazon. It’s best to buy the one you can roll to turn the compost. I prefer a compost tumbler bin because it turns the compost well—unlike the other bins that need you to take a shovel and turn the compost manually. You can also make a good compost bin at home from old materials you already have. You need to have screws/nuts, a saw, and a drill. You need a drill to create holes around your composting bin because air is one of the most important factors when composting. See ideas below and read this article to learn the steps to creating your compost bin. 

Make a tumbler compost bin from an old drum: Find an old drum that you can use to make a compost bin. See how you can create a drum composter from old plastic barrels. 

Old trash bin or anything that looks like a big container: It can be a bucket, stainless steel bin, a trash can, and etcetera. Use a drill to create holes all over the container.

Make a compost bin using wood: Before you buy lumber, see if you have some old pallets or leftover lumber from old projects. Also, if you have a piece of furniture that can work as a compost bin, you can use that. Make sure you leave lots of open space for air.

Open pile composting: You create a heap of compost as long as it’s not placed right next to a wall.