“We think Compost Mobile is awesome because it’s making a difference at the ground level,” said Jeff Potter, author of Cooking for Geeks who is one of the Awesome Food trustees. “They’re figuring out how to take food scraps from the home and use them to help low-income communities start gardens and urban farms. It’s an awesome idea because it takes a bunch of problems—waste, food illiteracy, lack of nutritious food—and cancels them out by combining them in an awesome way!”

Jennifer Siqueira, coordinator of Compost Mobile and co-founder of Up-Lab with Hector F. Burga, had been working in community gardens locally, when she learned of  a similar scraps to-compost effort in Washington DC. (There are similar efforts throughout the country).

Jennifer explained, “I had friends who came to me with their scraps of food, asking me to take it to my other friends in various community gardens throughout Miami. I started wondering if I could start a program where hundreds of individuals could start disposing of their food scraps in the same manner and in doing so provide a wider community benefit. Since the number one commodity of a great farm or garden is good soil, I started questioning why we should continue dumping perfectly good compostables in landfills, when we can re-use them to create a network of collaboration and alternative sustainability practices in Miami.”

“With this funding opportunity from Awesome Food, we can get more people participating in the program and coordinate with other Up-Lab efforts of similar scope,” she said.

The first compost pickup, which took place in July 2011, was a 10 pounds of compost delivered to the compost pile at Earth & Us Farm in Miami.  Compost Mobile started with only two households in July, but grew to four households in August and eight households in September. Now the service collects about 30 pounds of scraps per week from between 15 and 20 residences and small businesses.

In order to start collecting scraps in any neighborhood, they need 10 homes to compost in each area. Currently, they are hoping to start four groups in Miami Beach, Brickell, Upper East Side and El Portal.

Compost Mobile’s motto is “We want your scraps. Stale Food. Inedible. Leftovers.” Residential customers are given a plastic bucket to collect their food scraps.  The process is very simple, explained Vanessa Stelmach, one of Compost Mobile’s clients.  ”All I do is collect my food scraps in a plastic bin and once a week Jennifer comes to my place to pick it up, usually on Saturdays. If I’m not going to be home, I leave my bucket at the front door steps and a few hours later, I pick up the empty bin and start collecting my scraps again, or sometimes I drop the scraps off at the farm where she lives.” Ms. Stemach added, “Jennifer pretty much is my organic garbage lady ;)”

Compost Mobile customers are charged a disposal and pick-up fee, but compost recipients receive the scraps at no charge.  “The idea of collecting food scraps isn’t something that most people understand, so getting them to invest in a compost bin was too much,” said Jennifer. “With the funding, we can get more people participating in the program. The more that people see it, the more they can understand the benefits on the environment. Someone who lives in a high-rise, just by giving their food scraps, becomes connected to the community farm they walk by, and that helps people become connected and learn more about their food.”

Compost Mobile will use the grant towards purchasing more composting buckets, which cost around $18 a piece, for clients’ homes.

For more information about Compost Mobile, contact  at Jennifer[at]up-lab[dot]org! You can also follow the project on Facebook and Twitter.

Below is a picture of Compost Mobile’s first batch of food scraps which was delivered

to the compost pile at Earth & Us Farm in July 2011.

(Compost Mobile gives permission for all pictures here to be grabbed and used for other posts)

So, 600 is a record for any of the Awesome Foundation chapters, and it will take us a bit to figure out how to process them. But we are scurrying around trying to figure out how to narrow it down.

And yes, the applications are good for subsequent rounds. If they are not time sensitive, the top ones will automatically be rolled into considerations.

In our ideal world, we’d announce in early September. (Wiggle room)

Each month, Awesome Food will give one applicant $1,000 to help pull off an awesome idea involving food. The ideas must relate to food in some form, and the definition will be more inclusive than exclusive. Examples could include educating the public about DIY-farming, creating an ad-hoc eatery in a subway car, or recording videos of immigrants’ recipes.

Anyone is eligible to apply: For profit, non-profit, individuals, companies, schools, adults, children. The $1,000 grants are not be loans or investments. They are not expected to be paid back. They are no-strings attached grants. The Awesome Foundation has a FAQ on how the grants work.

Awesome Food follows the Awesome Foundation model, which creates an independent and self-funded board of trustees who dedicate their time and resources to give out genius microgrants. The current list of Awesome Food trustees and advisors include:

Alaina Browne of Serious Eats — New York, NY
Barry A. Martin of Hypenotic — Toronto, Canada
Christine Liu — Boston, Masschusetts
Dan Barber of Blue Hill Farms — New York, New York
Food52 (Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs) — New York, New York
Foodspotting Team — San Francisco, California
James Cronin of Paul A Young Fine Chocolates — London, UK
Jeff Potter, author of Cooking for Geeks — Los Angeles, California.
Jennifer 8. Lee, journalist and author
Josh Simon of Function Drinks — Los Angeles, California
Kamal Rashid Nuri of Truly Living Well — Atlanta, Georgia
Rolando Robledo of Clover Food Lab — Boston, Massachusetts
Eric Silverstein of Peached Tortilla — Austin, Texas

Jade Applegate *Chapter Dean — Walking across the country
Meredith Blumenstock *Chapter Dean — Boston, Massachusetts

Awesome Food will join the global network of Awesome Foundations, which recently received a six-figure grant from Knight Foundation to support its activities. The Awesome Foundation originally started in Boston in 2009 and has since grown to be a worldwide network of people with nearly 20 chapters in cities across the world, including San Francisco, New York City, Ottawa, London, Berlin, Sydney, Zurich, among numerous other places. Projects funded have included a giant hammock in Boston, tram sessions in Melbourne, and a fab lab in Washington DC. In addition, the Awesome Foundation recently established the Institute of Higher Awesome Studies as a non-profit.

Awesome Food focuses on helping the world realize awesome ideas to further food and culture. “We’re not entirely sure what ideas we’ll get—that’s part of the fun of this!” said Jeff Potter, author of Cooking for Geeks. “But we’ll know awesomeness when we see it. I’m excited to see what ideas we receive, and can’t wait to see what ideas we can help turn into reality.”

Follow Awesome Food at twitter.com/awesomefood and facebook.com/awesomefood.

Questions? Contact us.