Harnessing the power of kitchen scraps
May 27, 2009
The talk was of nitrogen from kitchen scraps, and carbon from a source like hay or straw or leaves.
And the talk was of time and heat and water. In the right proportions, the day's kitchen scraps would turn into compost that would nourish the vegetable plants and feed people and create new kitchen scraps.
Henry Owen, right in blue shirt, was the day's
instructor in how to manage a compost pile. The day's headline: If the
pile stinks, add carbon – that is, add leaves or clean grass or straw or
hay.
Owen helped get Friendship Trays started with its demonstration garden. Since the first vegetables were planted in raised beds, Community Culinary School students have been working in the garden, learning how to propogate the food that they are learning to prepare in the rest of their Culinary School work.
For some students, composting is old hat. For others, it may be as new as the recipes they are learning. So there was some surprise by one ratio Owen offered: In the compost pile, add 20 to 30 volumes of a carbon source for each one volume of nitrogen source. That means two things, Owen pointed out:
First, each pile of kitchen scraps will require a huge pile of hay or leaves or other carbon source.
Second, it would require a huge backyard space to make it possible for the Culinary School and Friendship Trays to compost all the kitchen scraps from feeding 700 or more people each day.
Friendship Trays Executive Director Lucy Bush Carter
said after the training session that plans were in the works to send to
the hogs at Grateful Growers whatever kitchen scraps could not be
accommodated in the composting operation.
Owen sprinkled dark compost around a cucumber plant during the class. He told the students the compost had been in the making in his home garden for about nine months.