Bokashi Composting

theo holding a banana with bokashi bin

What is Bokashi Composting?

Bokashi Composting is a unique indoor product used to recycle food scraps into an organic soil conditioner and create your own homemade plant food. Bokashi means fermented organic matter. Bokashi composting uses anaerobic (without oxygen) fermentation to break down food scraps very quickly while avoiding rotting odors.

Why use the Bokashi Bin?

The Bokashi Bin produces a nutrient tea to feed to your garden and house plants, breaks down food scraps in less than half the time of conventional composting, and greatly increases the population of beneficial microbes.

  • Enables composting of all food scraps-including meat, dairy and oils- diverting them from landfills

  • Convenient and indoor solution

  • No rotting odors (click this link for an explanation)

closeup on food scraps

How to use the Bokashi Bin

Add your food scraps to your Bokashi bin once a day (you can include meat and dairy as well as traditional compostable material).

Every time you add food scraps to your Bokashi bin, make sure the majority of food scraps are lightly dusted with bran. After a week or so, you will be able to drain the nutrient tea from the spout at the bottom of the bin. Once your bin begins producing tea, drain it every 2-3 days and dilute in a gallon of water.

blonde sprinkling bran in bokashi bin brunette sprinkling bran in the bokashi bin

 

 

 

 

 

 

Important Notes: Drain the nutrient tea out of the bin every 2-3 days.
Dilute the tea in 1 gallon of water. Immediately pour the solution on the soil around any plants in your home or garden. For quick and easy disposal, pour tea (of any dilution) down a drain to help clean the drain. Rinse with water.

brunette draining tea

blonde using watering can in garden

 

Using the Scraps (after final fermentation): Dig a trench about 6-8 inches deep, put the scraps in the trench and cover with at least 3-4 inches of soil. In 2-4 weeks, the scraps will have completely decomposed into rich soil. Or: Add the scraps to a traditional compost system (pile or tumbler). This is OK even though you may have put items (e.g., meat, dairy) in the bokashi bin that you would not ordinarily put in your other compost system. The microbes from the bokashi bran will enhance the performance of your other compost system and accelerate the production of compost.

click here to download a PDF with detailed instructions

Green30 Challenge Rebate Application

Take the Green30 Challenge! By downsizing to a green 30‐gallon trash cart and taking a composting class you may qualify for a rebate on a home composter. As part of Austin’s Zero Waste goal to reduce the amount of waste Austinites send to the landfill by 90% by the year 2040, rebates of 75%* of the value of a purchased home composter are being offered to Solid Waste Services residential customers.

click here to download the application form.

patrick pouring out nurtient tea
Owner Patrick Van Haren pouring nutrient tea into a compost pile

man pouring compost scraps into the ground
To improve the health of your soil, bury the food scraps in your soil that have been broken down in your Bokashi bin.

 

Products

Sell price
Austin Rebate Special - 2 Bokashi Bins + 1 Bran for $100 $100.00

Blendtec Total Blender 		$499.95
Bokashi Bin compost system
Bokashi Bin 		$65.00

Bokashi Bran 		$10.00

Bokashi Bran - 2 bags (courier special) 		$18.00

Bokashi System Secondary Storage Pail 		$15.00

Flexible and Easy Poly Compost / Leaf Storage Bin 		$35.00
Re-useable Leaf Bags $10.00