Hint: there’s more to it than onion peels — but that’s a great place to start!
Composting basics
Many unexpected things can indeed go in a compost heap alongside food scraps. So to dive deeper into the topic, I interviewed some local composting companies who gave me insights into what’s acceptable and what’s not.
Keeping in mind, a home compost can often handle less than commercial composting. This post is intended for large scale composting, either via a city-wide or private program, as this is a big way people compost nowadays due to dense city dwellings with little to no access to land on which to set up a local compost. To be sure, all the items on this list can go in your home compost too, they might just take longer to break down.
Check out this lighthearted track by the Australian band Formidable Vegetable. It always gets me in mood to think about waste and sustainability:
1. Natural corks
Hard cider corks, wine corks, champagne corks, aka bouchons de liège… can all be composted because they are made of the bark of the cork oak or chêne-liège (Quercus suber), a gnarly heat-loving tree that grows happily around the Mediterranean. They must be real cork though, mat-looking and a little rugged. Because if they are shiny and smooth, they’re most likely a plastic imitation. A composting facilitator warns me, “Be careful, it’s hard to tell which are fake ones.”
The thick, unusually cushiony bark gets peeled right off the tree, similar to cinnamon. It eventually grows back which makes cork a sustainable material. But the process takes time (9 to 12 years!), hence the cheaper, faster, faux cork.
Needless to say, real cork will enrich a compost pile with its organic matter. But since it is quite a noble material, you may want to give it a more directly renewed life. One way to do this is through the company Recork, which takes them and turns them into other cork products.
2. Chopsticks, popsicle sticks, toothpicks
Many other woody objects fill our daily lives, be they of wood or bamboo. Chopsticks, popsicle sticks, and toothpicks (baguettes, bâtonnets de glace, et cure-dents) end up tossed in the garbage without a second thought. They all deserve a better resting place.
“These things are good, but they must be untreated,” one composting specialist emphasizes. To be sure, some are made of plastic or have a shiny varnish coat (which is also plastic).
Just imagine how many popsicles or paletas are eaten each summer in any given city, town, or even pool party!
To take this a step further, you can get sturdy chopsticks and say no to take-out ones.
3. Egg cartons, paper napkins, pizza boxes
Also from wood: wood pulp, cardboard, and paper. As you might know, many recycling companies do not want greasy napkins or pizza boxes in their collection bins. That’s okay, the compost will take them — so long as they aren’t soiled with anything other than food. For pizza boxes, “just make sure there are no stapled receipts attached and break them down a bit.”
Egg cartons can easily go in the recycling. But let’s face it, recycling bins are usually overflowing with shipping boxes, soda cans, and paper bags. Recycling also requires quite a bit of energy, so why not allow egg cartons to quietly break down into compost? To reiterate, the paper must be pure with no plastic coatings or shiny labels, or else we’re simply adding plastic waste to black gold.
Some egg vendors at farmers market will also take empty egg cartons to fill them back up. A lovely way to keep things truly circular.
4. Swedish cloths
My favorite item on the list! Swedish cloths are a type of dish cloth cleverly made of cellulose (wood pulp) and invented by a Swedish company. You can get those in black for invisible staining, in a slick neutral grey which I tend to prefer, or in bright pastel colors for a more upbeat look.
Just one of these can replace over a dozen rolls of paper towels, wasting less resources and money in the long run. What’s more, they can be sanitized in a dishwasher, in the laundry, or in boiling water. I started using these at home years ago and have never gone back.
After many months of use when they start to fall apart, they can just be chopped up and put to rest in a compost bin.
Here’s a famous 1997 song by an eco-conscious French band, “Our Countryside’s Anthem” that’s more than fitted for our theme:
5. Packing peanuts
Well, not all packing peanuts… But some! Nowadays you find more and more options for plastic-free packaging, including packing peanuts. Although commonly made of that impossible-to-recycle styrofoam, some are now made from plant starches (like corn, potato, and wheat). Have you ever tried dunking one in water? It melts!
So that’s the test, get a packing peanut wet and see how it reacts. No reaction? It’s a plastic one doomed to remain styrofoam. If it shrinks and becomes gooey, it’s starch. Both can be reused of course, but if not, the starch one can also be composted.
Feed the soil that feeds you
I hope you feel inspired to make some soil! I trust that together we can build a world where we borrow from the land and feed it, so it can then feed us. And in doing so, honoring what our ancestors had done for ages and that our modern way of life has too often impeded.
Enjoy the process!
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