EATING IN THE JOINT

Several people have asked me "So what's the first thing you ate when you got out?" The truth is I don't remember. And that's because I simply didn't find prison food to be all that horrible that I craved good food and fantasized what I would first eat upon reentry to society. Also, I'm not really a "foodie" like that. Consider the fact that for the past few years, I've mostly dined on whatever's offered at soup kitchens or pantries where I volunteer.

So anyway...inquiring minds want to know what prison food is like. When it comes to MCC, the meals aren't outstanding. But you can eat reasonably well without ordering a pile of junk food from commissary as so many inmates did. 

Breakfast consisted of cereal (lots of it), all the fat-free milk you wanted, either coffee cake or muffins (of which you could get at least two), and a piece (or many if you wanted) of fruit. Lupes (the lead officer in the kitchen) got our bran from two different sources. Which we got depended on the Amazon bid that got accepted (yes, he bought the cereal from Amazon). Unfortunately, one supplier's bran was inedible. Like really bad. The other's was actually quite good. Whichever bid he won, we'd be stuck for at least a month as Lupes ordered in bulk. 

Fortunately, you could buy decent bran on commissary - provided they had it in stock. Which they often didn't. MCC was frequently out of stock of at least 1/3rd of the items you ordered. Despite...the bottom line was that breakfast worked for me. I always got up at 6 AM to eat it - though I would generally take a shower and then go back to sleep until lunch.

Lunch varied in quality but was generally superior to the evening meal. Tuesday was chicken patty day and Wednesday featured a combo soy and beef burger. Both weren't bad if you avoided the condiments which were simply awful. A company named Winston supplies the Federal Bureau of Prisons with individual condiment packs of mind-bogglingly poor quality.

Thursday was chicken quarter day, the winner by most accounts. In fact, any number of inmates would pay you $2 (in the form of a tuna pack or two Mackerel packs) for the dark meat offering. Not being a fan of dark meat chicken, I sold mine. Inevitably, somebody would be cross with me for ignoring his request. But hey! I only gots one piece - and I wasn't the type to hold an auction for the fucking chicken. 

Finally, Friday was fish day - which if prepared well (which it often was not), was another crowd favorite. If you wanted seconds, it was always available except for chicken quarters. They were way too popular to get two of!

As noted, dinner wasn't as tasty as lunch. We might get what was laughably called chicken fried rice...or bean burritos (ugh)...or Philly cheese steak...or some really greasy beef sort of stuff which many inmates avoided like the plague because overeating it (or eating it at all) could cause gastronomic distress. Weekly Swedish meatballs was another of most inmates' least popular meal.

The trick to good eating at MCC lay in working food service (which I did). Not only could you raid the produce cooler and eat as much fruit as you wanted, but we often got a run at the officers' mess food (especially if you helped the dishwashers rack trays - which I did). And the warehouse boasted numerous goodies the likes of the aforementioned coffee cakes and muffins. If that wasn't enough to fill your stomach, the kitchen workers were given big portions of food (mostly chicken quarters or patties) to take to the unit after the shift was over. Additionally, the boys stole all manner of sustenance which they stuffed in their crotch hoping not to get apprehended. Often, Will would tell whichever officer was tasked with frisking us "don't bother with Mersey. He doesn't steal." I was in the minority if not all alone in that distinction. The punishment for stealing from the kitchen just wasn't punitive enough to stop anybody. And at the six cents per hour wage paid to the kitchen workers, it was hard to blame the boys for their larceny. Me? I just didn't want to suffer the humiliation of getting caught stealing a two dollar pepper. It was beneath my dignity.

Food at Rikers Island (where I was falsely imprisoned - more about that later) was much worse - and much less plentiful. I found myself eating crap I wouldn't have even considered consuming at MCC just to keep my belly full. Curiously, the Tombs (where I also spent a few days) had the same food as Rikers but much more of it. Again, I worked in the kitchen at Rikers and the deal was more or less the same. You work the kitchen - you eat better. It's like that pretty much in all jails and prisons.

Bottom line: You won't starve behind bars. It's really not that bad. But there was the unique occasion at MCC (like when Epstein killed himself) when we got locked into our cells for two or three days and fed bologna and cheese sandwiches. But that was the exception and thankfully, not the rule.