The Compost Queen

    When it comes to making compost, Martha Stewart ain’t got nothin’ on me. I make the best—and by best I mean the most expensive-- compost around.

    The compost at the Sume house is full of good intentions: here is the broccoli I was going to steam for dinner; here are the other veggies that were to make up our new, healthier eating life style. It was a life style that never got off the ground because in my family, we like our broccoli best when it’s covered in cheese. And it that case, it’s probably healthier not to eat broccoli at all.

    Our compost is full of freckled bananas, slimy lettuce, and limp celery. Composting helps me feel less guilty about being wasteful.

  Our compost also contains useful, non-wasteful ingredients: coffee grounds, eggshells, teabags, potato peelings, shredded junk mail. (Insider’s Tip: old issues of the Shopper are great added to your compost pile. Be sure to clip this column out first, because of course you will want to hang it on your refrigerator…or maybe it’s just my mom who does that. Hi mom!)

   I know that you are supposed to turn your compost pile at regular intervals but I am far too lazy for that, and so far it’s worked out for me. An occasional squirt from the hose keeps it moist.

    Making compost is not rocket science and even though some people---I’m looking at you, Internet—act like it is, it’s really pretty simple: you put the food scraps and paper in the bin, they magically turn into to compost, you put it in your garden with fantastic results. Try it; your plants will love you for it.

     Next week: what NOT to compost.