Eat lots of produce, mellons, bananas and things that have a little waste to build up your pile. Bigger piles work better. I also found a recycling place in my town where people just toss their cardboard boxes. I shred those up. Everything needs to be 1-2" in size to work best. In my region of the country, arid rocky mtns, you want a 50% carbon to 50% nitrogen ratio. Other parts of the country you may want 70% carbon.
If you want to compost manure, use a different pile. Your cold compost from your house scraps will work best alone. Manure can toss your pile out of wack.
I'm a huge fan of red wiggler worms. I turn my regular pile for a month or two and then put it in my outdoor worm bin that is open to the ground, basically a raised garden bed with a lid. I toss in some handfuls of gypsum and then cover the top of the compost with wet towels. If they dry out, then I rewet. With the half finsished compost the worms go to town like I have never seen. They multiply like mad and start giving you harvestable compost in a few weeks...assuming your worm population is healthy, which doesn't take long with this method. I take a 1/4" mesh screen and shake the compost on top, the finished stuff falls through. The quality is amazing if using homemade food scraps. Worms, all the way.
