Urban Composting: A Chef Jade Primer | Cooking With Jade

Urban Composting: A Chef Jade Primer

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As I hope I’ve made clear, I am forever trying to do my part to protect the environment (we still only have the one planet to live on; might as well take care of it!). This means that I’m serious about composting. It doesn’t hurt that I absolutely love it: composting helps me connect to the earth in a very tangible way. I think there is this myth that, to do composting the right way, you have to have tons of yard space and a massive compost pile. Thankfully, this isn’t true. I live in the most crowded city in the country, yet I still have plenty of room to compost. Here’s how I do it.

Urban Composting

See If Your City Has a Community Composting Program

One of the many things I love about living in New York is that this city makes a huge investment in composting. We produce a lot of waste, but we know how to use it! The city has several compost drop-off centers, as well as neighborhood bins (the bins were just recently introduced, and I’m so glad the city made this decision). Compost collected at these sites either gets used to improve the city’s parks and gardens, or gets used for clean energy. I highly recommend seeing if your city has a similar program. You may be pleasantly surprised!

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Compose Trash Bin

Invest in an Outdoor Composter

An outdoor composter is a space-effective way to store and redistribute plant waste. You shouldn’t have to look far to find a composter that will fit on your porch or balcony. Since I am an avid window gardener (What can I say? I run with a fast crowd), I like to store my plant waste in my handy composter for about a month, before redistributing it in my garden. The internal mixing bars and aeration system helps nature do it’s thing. And no, you don’t have to worry about attracting rodents and other unwanted guests: these babies are airtight!

Invest in an Indoor Composter

If you are a little less outdoorsy, you could opt for an indoor composter. I have both an outdoor and an indoor composter—my composting game is on point! Actually, I just bought my indoor composting machine from a company called Lomi, and I’ve already fallen in love with it. I’m a card-carrying member of the Clean Plate Club, but on the rare occasions that I’m left with food scraps, I place them in my Lomi and press the button on the front of the machine. This heats and grinds the compost, while neutralizing any odors. And because the machine is roughly the size of an air fryer, it easily fits in my microscopic kitchen.

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Compose Pit

Do you want take action to help combat Climate Change? Visit our Partners at GenZero to find out how – https://app.genzeroaction.com/

If you enjoyed this article or have suggestions on how we can improve it, please leave us a comment below. Also, make sure to check out other articles I’ve created or stories I’ve written about food culture – here.


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