Besides the cost, there’s the real estate you have to allocate to your countertop kitchen compost container. If you use a different container you need to make sure the lid is tight or you’re going to end up with a pestilence of fruit flies in your kitchen. Yucko. Here’s how to do this at low cost, free of fruit flies, and without giving up a spot on your counter:
- Buy the little bin liners from someplace other than your compost vendor. I know they say not to. That is bullpuckey. In the Boston area, you can get them from Market Basket. Even better, use compostable produce bags to bag your veggies at Trader Joe’s and reuse them to bag the compost.
- Instead of having a compost bin on the counter, keep your compost in yogurt containers in the freezer. You can use the bags to line the yogurt containers, or …
- A bit more labor-intensive: don’t line the yogurt containers. Wait until you have 2-3 containers full of compost before discarding it. You can skip weeks because the stuff is safely stowed in the freezer. This will save on bags.
- When you’re ready to take the compost out, take it out of the freezer and let it thaw for 10-30 minutes. Then it will easily come out of the yogurt container whether or not you’ve lined the container with a bag.
- Rinse out the yogurt containers and reuse them. A couple of caveats: You really shouldn’t reuse the yogurt containers for food storage because it’s hard to get the garbage smell out. Also, I don’t recommend using ice cream containers to hold compost in the freezer. Guess why.