Countertop Composter Showdown
Countertop composters don’t actually compost (although they can help), but they do reduce food waste, eliminate methane emissions, and keep garbage-attracted pests at bay. I put the FoodCycler (left) and Lomi (right) head-to-head to test which device wastes the competition. Photo credit The Vine
Life in Irvine is about to get messy.
With our city’s new Organics Waste Recycling Program, residents are required to toss food scraps directly into green recycling bins. Without plastic trash bags to minimize odors (and the pests attracted to them), we could be facing a pretty gross future.
Fortunately, a new class of kitchen appliances can help. Countertop composters dry out and grind up organic waste in a fraction of the time it would take to actually compost food scraps using traditional techniques. These devices dramatically reduce trash volume. The ground up, dehydrated powder they produce can be tossed into green organic bins without the mess and odor of unprocessed food scraps.
These devices also combat climate change. While spoiled and rotting food sitting in landfills emits methane (a greenhouse gas 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide), that trash processed in either of these devices emits no greenhouse gases. Both devices use about as much energy as it takes to run your dishwasher.
With high hopes for cleaner, leaner trash and reduced greenhouse gas emissions, I couldn’t resist testing two of the leading organic trash dehydrator machines. I took a few weeks with the FoodCycler and Lomi to see how they stacked up against each other.
TLDR: Both machines make the process of properly disposing organic waste easy. Even without the new city requirements, these machines have huge upsides by drastically diminishing trash volume and odors. The Lomi outperformed the FoodCycler in terms of versatility, food scrap breakdown, and overall ease of use.
FoodCycler
The FoodCycler hums along at a quiet 50 decibels while running. Photo credit The Vine
Sold by Vitamix in the United States (and by Breville in Australia and New Zealand) the FoodCycler is a sneaky assassin in the food scraps processing game. It operates at a whisper (around 50 decibels according to my Apple Watch) and, when filled with the right balance of scraps (more on that later), it produces a hand full of faintly-odored flaky chips that can be tossed directly into a green organics bin. The machine has a gray and black angular Star Wars aesthetic and would be at home in any Stormtrooper’s kitchen.
The FoodCycler can take pretty much any food scraps or plate scrapings except large bones, hard pits, and sticky sweets (see details below). Its relatively compact bucket comes with a charcoal filter-lined lid to be used for storage. We put ours under the sink. When the bin is full, the bucket lid is removed and the bucket is transferred to the FoodCycler. This straightforward device has only one setting that is easily launched with a press of the power button.
On the plus side, the FoodCycler does exactly what it claims to: within four to eight hours (in my experience it was always closer to four hours), the food scraps shrink to about eighty percent of their original size. Sometimes the resulting scraps are fully dried out and easily removed. Sometimes they are stuck to the sides, the rotating arm, and the small area of the bucket not coated with its non-stick porcelain coating. In this case, a soak in hot water and/or an excavation with a plastic utensil (use plastic to protect the coating) can remove most of the residue.
Occasionally, scraps are still damp or oily. Once I added a half-eaten burrito and discovered a sloppy mess at the end of the cycle. I simply added additional scraps to the bucket and ran it again to process the scraps.
A couple of times, I put the dishwasher safe bucket through a regular dishwasher cycle. It came out clean but with some nonstick coating lost in the process.
The filters work extremely well at eliminating the smell of hot trash. An indicator light alerts users when a filter needs to be replaced, but a user’s nose will already be well aware. Replacing the filters every three to four months costs $29.95 when ordering directly from Vitamix.
Over time a FoodCycler user will discover the all-important mix of foods that need to be added to produce the right consistency of processed food scraps. I found myself eating more hardboiled or scrambled eggs in order to add eggshells to the scraps. Eggshells seem to be the best assurance that processed scraps will be fully dried out and easy to remove.
On the downside, the FoodCycler is a bit of a drama queen that requires some special care. Its heavy bucket is supposed to drop into the machine when properly aligned with the bucket’s arrow. I find it requires gently tilting the bucket just so to get it to settle properly into place. Getting the bucket out also requires a bit of finesse. If the mixture of food scraps is too wet, too dry, too oily, or simply too much of any one thing, expect to go to work extracting pieces wedged beneath or between the machine’s rotating arms and walls. Having said that, it’s worth a little work to have all the benefits the FoodCycler offers.
This review is based on the Original Foodcycler FC-50 model. A new FoodCycler model that has a larger bucket and a more modern aesthetic is not out yet. The website promises that it is coming soon.
FoodCycler FAQ
-
Feel free to add:
Most fruit and vegetable scraps
Meat, shellfish, and poultry scraps
Cheese
Beans, seeds, and legumes
Chicken and fish bones/shells
Coffee grounds, filters, and tea bags
Eggs and eggshells
Also, in limited quantities:
Cake
Rice
Bread
Pasta
High sugar fruits (grapes, bananas, melon, oranges and pineapple)
Sauces
Jams
Jellies
Peanut butter
-
Unless you want to break your machine, don’t add:
Hard, dense bones (beef, pork, lamb and bison)
Candy or gum
Cooking oils and greases
Hard pits (peaches, apricots, nectarines)
Nuts and other hard shells
Pineapple leaves
Watermelon rinds
If you really want to add these, cut them up first:
Fibrous herbs & plants (celery, parsley, etc.)
Corn cobs & husks
Paper towels/tissue
-
The bucket insert has a 2 liter capacity. For our household of four people, we filled up the bucket and ran the FoodCycler every one to two days.
-
The rectangular FoodCycler FC-50 is 12.6 inches wide, 14.2 inches high, and 12 inches deep.
Its glossy, gray sides and matt black top evoke a Deathstar trash bin vibe.
-
The FoodCycler has a built-in sensor that monitors the humidity of the food waste. Once it completes the drying and grinding process, the machine stops automatically.
It takes about four to eight hours to complete a cycle. In our household, it was usually closer to four hours.
-
According to the FoodCycler website, “Each cycle consumes approximately 0.8-1.5 kWh per cycle, which is roughly equivalent running a desktop computer for the same amount of time as the cycle.”
-
Lomi
Lomi runs at a louder 60 decibels when drying and mixing food scraps. Photo credit The Vine
Made by Pela Earth, the company that creates sustainably produced plastic-free phone cases, Lomi is a countertop food dehydrator and grinder that offers a little bit more of everything. If the FoodCycler is a drama queen, the Lomi is a low-key alpha. Its matte white, smoothly rounded surfaces exude effortless cool. Lomi’s lighter but larger bucket slips seamlessly into the machine: no dramatic dance is needed to align it just so. The roomier bucket allows my family of four to go for two to three days between cycles.
Lomi also offers versatility. It has three modes for processing food scraps: Eco-Express mode, Lomi Approved mode, and Grow mode. Some of these modes necessitate adding a LomiPod, a small tablet that helps break down food and bioplastics.
Eco-Express mode operates with the least energy expenditure and effectively processes food scraps just like the FoodCycler. The Eco-Express mode is supposed to take three to five hours to fully process scraps, but this mode finishes closer to five or six hours in my experience.
Lomi Approved mode is for food scraps as well as bioplastics and Lomi approved product packaging. Only ten percent of the contents processed should be bioplastics or packaging and this mode requires the addition of a LomiPod. See Lomi approved bioplastics and packaging here. Much of the packaging a Lomi device is shipped with can go into Lomi for processing.
Grow mode is for fruit and vegetable scraps only. Bioplastics and cooked or processed food cannot be used in this mode as it is designed to produce the perfect starter for excellent garden compost. Grow mode heats it contents at a low temperature for a long time to preserve micronutrients that will benefit soil. It takes sixteen to 20 hours to complete this cycle and requires the addition of a LomiPod.
All of the modes work well, but Eco-Express is my preference. It’s relatively fast, extremely effective, and doesn’t require researching a brand of packaging to see if it’s Lomi approved.
In order to put both devices to the test, I filled both buckets with identical contents: banana peels, bell pepper cores and stems, strawberry tops, scallions, carrot peels, cucumber peel, and apple cores went into each machine. After five hours in the FoodCycler and six hours in the Lomi, we compared the contents. Both machines had dramatically minimized the food scraps, but the FoodCycler’s results were still somewhat damp and sticky residue had to be removed. The Lomi’s remaining scraps were powdery, dry, and odorless. It was worth the extra hour of processing to avoid having to remove stuck residue in the Lomi.
Despite its impressive performance in this side by side comparison, Lomi is not perfect. It’s a bit louder than the FoodCycler (around 60 decibels according to my Apple Watch). Lomi’s bucket slides in easily, but closing its bulky lid takes some practice to master.
While the FoodCycler comes with an additional charcoal-lined bucket lid for storage, the Lomi does not come with any way to protect the contents of the bucket between cycles (other than storing the bucket in the machine itself). This would be fine except with each addition of food scraps to the bucket, Lomi beeps loudly as its lid is removed and replaced. This is both irritating and wastes an unnecessary, although small, amount of electricity. I tried using a separate mini plastic bin to store food scraps between Lomi cycles, but it didn’t have a filter in the lid and the resulting smell quickly became unbearable.
Unlike the FoodCycler’s filters, which are containers that hold charcoal pieces to absorb odors, the Lomi’s filter containers come empty. The machine is shipped with two bags of loose charcoal pieces to fill its two filter chambers. Filling these chambers with charcoal is messy and can leave dark smudges on the machine’s matte white surface.
No machine can do it all. The Lomi can process pineapple leaves, watermelon rinds, bioplastics, as well as Lomi approved packaging, which the FoodCycler cannot. But the FoodCycler can process small poultry bones, which the Lomi cannot.
I find the Lomi’s overall versatility, ease of use, effective waste processing, and appealing aesthetic make it the preferred countertop composter. Some might prefer the FoodCycler for its lower price, smaller bucket (for smaller families), quieter machine operation, and superior filter replacement. The FoodCycler storage lid is also a big plus for storing the bucket in between cycles.
Although both machines have their benefits and drawbacks, either would make life with our new Organics Waste Recycling Program far easier and more pleasant.
Lomi FAQ
-
Depending on the mode you select, Lomi can process:
Coffee grounds
Eggs
Eggshells
Fruit scraps
Leafy greens
Legumes
Oats
Peels (soft)
Plant trimmings and flowers
Popcorn kernels (popped)
Seafood
Tea (loose leaf)
Tofu
Vegetable scraps
Yard trimmings
Depending on the mode you select, Lomi can process a limited amount of:
Apples
Chia/flax seeds
Dairy (except milk)
Fruit rinds
Lomi approved product
Lomi approved packaging
Nut butters
Thin nut shells
Pizza and pasta
Sauces
Syrups and confectionary items
-
Don’t even think about breaking your Lomi by adding:
Bones (hard)
Butter and cooking oils
Conifer branches
Cooked potatoes
Human or animal waste
Hygiene products
Liquids
Plastic lined bags
Non-organic materials
Nut shells (thick)
Popcorn kernels (unpopped)
Styrofoam
-
The Lomi bucket can accommodate 50% more than the FoodCycler bucket (three liters for Lomi as opposed to two liters for FoodCycler).
In our four person household it takes two to three days to fill the Lomi bucket.
With a larger bucket, fewer cycles are run. As a result, the time it takes between filter replacements is longer.
-
Lomi measures sixteen inches wide by thirteen inches tall by twelve inches deep.
Its matt white surface and smoothly curved edges embrace an entirely different aesthetic than the FoodCycler’s dark, glossy angular surface.
My daughter prefers the FoodCycler’s sleek modern shape to the Lomi’s lighter, rounder style. She says Lomi looks like an air conditioning unit. I prefer Lomi’s brighter, softer vibe.
-
Lomi’s energy usage depends on the mode selected for a cycle.
Eco Express: less than 0.60kWh
Lomi Approved: less than 0.75 kWh.
Grow Mode: around 1 kWh
-
A note about composting with “composters”
While many refer to these machines as “composters” and their processed waste as “dirt,” these devices do not compost directly. They create dehydrated food, which is still food. In order to make this dehydrated food into compost, it must be mixed with soil in a 1:10 ratio. Watching my dog eat scattered bits of “compost” in my garden was proof enough that the processed food may look like dirt but it is not.
Other Options
Let’s say you don’t have $300 to $500 to spend on an appliance for processing your organic waste. There are some choices available that won’t give local pests an open invitation to your garbage bin.
Freeze your scraps! This $20 compost bin is meant to fit in a freezer door shelf. Just remember to empty the frozen scraps into your green bin the night before or morning of trash collection.
Compost your scraps! This $82 composter, unlike the countertop appliances, is the real deal. Add all your food scraps, turn it every few days, and in a few weeks/months/years apparently it does break down and turn into a wonderful soil additive.
Toss your scraps! Not quite ready to change your trash habits? For $0 you can continue to throw your organic waste into the trash bin like you’ve always done. The city will not fine residents until 2024. Fines will only be issued after residents have received a warning.