we don't tend to do eggshells only cos we know people with chooks so they get the shells back (crush them into chook food - helps to make stronger shells on the new eggs!). all our left over cooked food goes to the dogs so nothing in the compost from there... no food (apart from onion peel and seeds from stuff) goes into the bin. if my bro is running short of food scaps for his worms, we might collect them up for the worms for a few days (usually salad leaves etc) and take them to him - we supply scraps and collect fresh liquid fertiliser. worm farm is definitely on the agenda for next year...
I have just bought a fantastic compost bin for my kitchen... HERE it is! What I like about it is that is both looks good (suits my retro kitchen) and is functional... it keeps in smells really well. I had some onion skins in there for a few days and the smell didn't seep out at all. I like how when it's full you can remove the interior black bucket to take out to the outside bin. Very easy to rinse out.
Highly recommended.
Make sure you don't put any meat or dairy in your compost - it will go funky and attract nasty interested creatures!!
My main tip is you need GREENS and BROWNS.
Green things are like veggie peelings, grass cuttings, etc, and are high in nitrogen.
BROWNS are things like straw, dried leaves, shredded soaked newspaper/cardboard, etc which are high in carbon.
If your compost is too wet, smelly, clumpy and mouldy, then you need to add more BROWN.
If your compost is too dry, or isn't breaking down, then you need to add more GREEN. Simple!
And finally, the more you turn it, it smells less, cooks hotter (killing weed seeds etc) and is ready sooner!
Compost seems so easy but is really confusing and intimidating unless you get good advice such as you have here!
I tried a compost heap so many times and in so many forms but just couldn't get it right... and finally, this year, I have it!! A week ago I just turned out my first beautiful compost which I dug into the garden beds and then planted the winter crop. It felt sooooo good.
What worked was all of the above advice!
Avoidance of meat and dairy
balance of brown and green (every now and again I would throw in a heap of ripped up news paper, DD loved helping me shred!)
Air circulation - I used a pole with a sort of hook, stuck in the compost pile which I would stab up and down a bit every time I added anything. It aerated the mix in a simple way
I recently saw a clip on gardening Aust where they placed chicken wire rolled up into a tube shape into the center of the compost bin (standing up) and dumped the compost around it. The wire tubes allowed air to get into the heap. I thought that was a great idea.
Just you wait till you realise that you wont have take the rubbish out to the bins as much anymore since food scraps all go a composting !
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It felt sooooo good. 
!
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