I usually listen to podcasts passively, catching snippets of information here or there and then moving on.

About a year ago, I heard a co-founder of a company called Mill tell one of my favorite climate-business reporters about a bin the size of a trash can that grinds and dehydrates food and turns it into grounds that can be used as a chicken feed ingredient, in the compost process, or in your own garden. What's more: People with city composting programs who tend to freeze their food scraps to participate and those who just throw their food scraps in the trash all liked this option better.

Those people sounded like me. I live in New York City and am a devoted composter, because the city makes it easy to do. But I have a small apartment with a small refrigerator and an even smaller freezer. There have been days (sometimes weeks) when food scraps have taken over all of my family's freezer space, stunk up our kitchen, or attracted flies. And while there is a newer composting program in the city with even more bins, I'm a bit suspect of where those are going, because the depositories take everything—organic or non-organic. So when the opportunity came to test a Mill and write about it, I was all in.

The Setup

When my Mill arrived, I'm not going to lie, it was heavy—but I was able to easily get it up to my apartment and assemble it via the instructions from the companion app. The best part may have been that the app asked us to name our Mill right off. My teenage son chose "Oscar" (nostalgia never dies).

That taken care of, I went through the app and set the time when Oscar would process the food scraps each day. Then I browsed the vast library in the app of common foods that my family eats that can (and can't) go in the Mill: avocados, check; artichoke leaves, no; bread, okay; cheese, check; melon, check—but cut up a bit …the list went on (and included meat!). Also on the no list: plastics, labels, and other non-food items. Definitely more options than straight compost.

Of note, the Mill needs to be set up near an electrical outlet. Despite my small apartment, I have an eat-in kitchen, so we placed Oscar next to the dining table. That turned out to be a relatively innocuous spot for a few reasons. First, it looks good: all white with a maple top. Second, it was out of the way yet close enough for deposits. And third, it made our Mill part of the family (more to come on this).

Week One

My husband told me that he would not be using the Mill and that it was "my thing." Then he and my son left for a 10-day vacation, and I proceeded to try and live without producing any waste for a week. During that time, any food scraps I had went into Oscar, and each night at 9 p.m. it would grind and dehydrate the contents if there were enough. Mill runs automatically when there's at least 150 grams, or the equivalent of about two banana peels, of food scraps in the bin. After a week, it wasn't even a quarter-full of grounds—but I had achieved no waste added to landfills for the week. Considering that the average American generates roughly 549 pounds of surplus food a year, that could make a dent in the long-term.

The Mill wasn't the only strategy I relied on to reduce my waste. Plastic is another offender in my house; everything seems to be wrapped in it: our food, our beauty and grooming products, our produce, and on and on. It isn't surprising that the U.S. produces millions of pounds of plastic waste a year—and only 9 percent is recycled, according to the U.S Department of Energy. Knowing this made me want to cut back as much as possible.

So I also changed the way I shopped for food. I didn't use plastic bags (even compostable ones) for my produce; instead I bought my fruits and vegetables loose. For other groceries, I looked for non-hard-plastic containers like bags and boxes. In some ways, I was already doing this—opting for old-school egg cartons rather than plastic ones, for example. I also sought out a waste-free grocery store where I was able to purchase grains and beans—stuff that usually comes in plastic bags—by weight in glass jars. I was even able to bring my extra glass jars there for others to reuse.

Week Two

Though my zero-waste experiment was done and dusted, I still relied on the Mill for all my food waste. And with the boys back from their trip, there was even more for Oscar to process. My son eats bananas like a gorilla, and the peels went right into the bucket. We eat avocados on salads and sandwiches daily; pits and skins went into the bucket. Every night, we would hear Oscar click to lock and start the process of grinding and dehydrating for hours. But that quiet sound was the only sign it was even there—because there was no smell whatsoever.

Week Three

One evening we were having a late dinner and the Mill started its cycle. "Oscar's going to work," my husband said. This started a conversation about how the Mill was now part of the family and has made our lives easier: How nice not to have garbage in the freezer, how nice not to have to track whether our block's compost bin was full or if we could make a deposit.

Week Four

After a month of daily deposits, our bucket is still not yet filled, since it can hold about 40 pounds of wet food scraps before it needs to be emptied. And according to the Mill app, my family (with Oscar's help, of course) has now diverted 21 pounds of food waste from landfills. Once Oscar is full, I'll schedule a pickup through the app and send the grounds to Mill to be turned into food for chickens, or add them to the bins provided by my local composting program. (If I had a garden or yard, another option would be to use the grounds myself, but alas...). This experiment made me a more conscientious shopper, and Mill is an excellent tool for anyone looking to reduce the impact of their waste. The sleek look and intuitive app have made it a new daily essential part of my routine.

#Food #Sustainability #MillComposter #ZeroWaste #Recycle