The Reality of Prison Kitchen: From Home-Cooked Meals to Corporate Profits

Larry Toothman reflects on how the prison kitchen has shifted from feeding people with dignity to maximizing corporate profits at the expense of quality and humanity.

Prison kitchens nowadays are run by a corporation intent on one thing: How much can I make? Prison kitchens were run back in my day (starting in 1989 in a Louisiana prison) as a way to feed the masses. What the hell ever happened to that practice?

Decline of Quality in Prison Food

Fast forward to 2015, and I’m back in a living hell. This time, further north, in a Kansas prison. The scenery hasn’t changed much, but the meals on the inside have gone to hell.

Gone are the days of chicken (real leg quarters), real beef burgers, corned beef hash, sunny side up eggs, and homemade, home-cooked foods. Most food gets warmed up to prepare it, and not very well, I might add.

Our food is always cold upon arrival, mainly because it gets trucked over to our unit. Our building doesn’t have a working kitchen on any of the three floors of our building.

Instant Meals and Mushy Substitutes

Our potatoes are instant. Oatmeal, just add water. Grits are instant, and our noodles are just add water.

You do that out in the world too. Here’s the difference: Our instant potatoes are always watery and look as if it were poured from a white-colored paint container. And you still have to drain the paint from oatmeal before you eat it. Our noodles are almost always mushy and most definitely overcooked.

Undercooked Desserts and Poor Oversight

Don’t get me started on the cookies and cakes that are dessert. The cookies are so soft, they wilt and droop when picked up, because they are most often doughy and undercooked. Most of the time, the cakes are so dry, you’re better off eating the frosting.

Through all this neglect and unsupervised action, where are the ones supervising?

Most kitchen staff (the ones contracted in Kansas) are to be found in their office, on their backsides with the A.C. blowing on them. Oh, they move when an inmate needs to retrieve something to further their cooking, because they get the keys to the city, so to speak. A kitchen worker has to unlock refrigerators, freezers, doors, cabinets, storage areas, pantries, and even cooking utensils and knives.

Aramark and the Business of Prison Kitchen

Aramark has the contract to run/feed the masses in Kansas prisons. They charge the State $1.25 per meal per inmate. Let’s say 5,000 inmates in Kansas. (When I was at a camp, the cost was $0.80 a meal.) For this nice change-over, the supervisor got a hefty bonus and a paid vacation.

All that money being thrown about, and it’s the inmates who suffer.

The “Fresh Favorites” Menu

The food on the trays is so bland and tasteless that they devised a “fresh favorites” menu. (There are no seasonings, due to too many allergies, diet restrictions, diabetics, and religious restrictions.) They sell the menu to the starving population, if you have money from loved ones at a mere $100-$500 a month. After all, prison isn’t cheap any more, either.

The “fresh favorites” menu consists of burgers, fries, pizza, roast beef sandwiches, full-blown salads (chef, caesar, and veggie deluxe), cooked meats by the pound, real chicken, taco meat, pulled pork, and beef. Even stuff for the sweet tooth. There are ice cream cakes, donuts, cake, cookies, one-third sheet pans of brownies, even one-pound bags of gummy bears.

Aramark charges $8-$10 for a pound of meat. $4-$6 for cookies and donuts. $8-$15 for cakes, depending on the number of layers and whether there’s ice cream.

Inmate Pay Versus Rising Prices

Many of us rely on the State to pay us $9 a month. In Kansas, everyone gets paid $9 a month, minus $1 for bookkeeping fees. Try living off that while you’re in here for a few years, with no more money coming in. (Like I do.)

The good news is that Kansas just gave its inmates a pay raise, the first of its kind in 40 years. In 2023, our $9 a month got a bit bigger, to $34 a month. But…

The prices of our canteen got jacked too. When I was locked up in 2013, the prices were fair. An 8-ounce jar of Folgers was $6 + tax. Now, it’s $11.50 + tax. A bag of Frito’s corn chips, previously $1.89, is now $5.50. A bag of Doritos was $2.00, now $5.00. A microwave bag of Act II popcorn, from $0.60 to $1.50. Good old Mountain Dew or Pepsi, from $1.25 to now $2.50. Even generic brands like Faygo were $0.75, now $1.50.

The Cost of Staying Connected

If you want to write home, stamps in 2013 were $0.50. Now they’re $0.78. $0.01 for paper, $0.05 per envelope (or box of 50 for $4.95), $0.70 pen or $0.15 pencil. So a letter costs $0.80-$0.90 now, depending on the amount of paper used and ink or pencil.

Big Business in Prison

If you’re like me (alone, with no one alive to help you), prison is always going to be rough and tumble. The worst part is that big business is and always will be part of prisons. There are just too many fingers in the pie, and everyone loves pie.

Interested in reading more? Don’t miss The Harsh Realities of Prison Food

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