Cruel and unusual punishment can come in multiple forms, including food. When prison disciplinary issues arise, inmates are punished on a lesser level by being served food that is much less desirable than the original menu.

Sprinkled throughout penal institutions in the United States and Canada is the dietary phenomenon of Nutraloaf—the Frankenstein monster of meatloaf. The unappetizing loaf is imposed upon inmates who have acted out. Consuming the mish-mash of beans, bread, raisins, and vegetables, however, is unlikely to put inmates in a better and more compliant mood.

Food can very easily become the biggest issue at a prison, even impacting the mood and behavior of inmates.

The consumption of sugar causes a spike in energy, but when too much sugar enters the body, the body tries to adjust by dropping blood sugar levels. This can produce irritability and a shorter fuse.

The thinking process also becomes less automatic and clear, and produces an overall more sluggish feeling.

There is also a cognitive reaction to unappetizing food, and overall not feeling happy or excited about eating it.

On the flip side, if one is eating balanced meals and has the necessary nutrient intake, serotonin is released in the brain and produces happiness.

Industrialization has lead prison food to be extremely processed, and must be quickly prepared in mass quantities. The majority of prison food contains a copious amount of refined starches, sugar, and sodium. An overabundance of these ingredients is likely to cause obesity and more health issues down the line.

It is very likely that those with food sensitivities or allergies are not provided with food that is safe for them to consume. Those who are practicing a certain religion with dietary requirements, such as inmates who are Jewish or Muslim may be unable to follow this practice.

What is quite scary is that is that there aren’t a lot of federal regulations for food safety and nutrition. The American Correctional Association is against the practice of using food as punishment. However, this is mostly just a suggestion to correctional institutions, as they are not legally required to follow this belief. It is up to state legislature to decide whether to make punishment by food legal.

Aramark Corporations is one of the major food service providers for prisons. It operates in over twenty countries, including those in North America. The corporation has faced plentiful legal backlash for providing inadequate portions and preparing food in unsanitary conditions.

Even the deliverymen of Aramark have produced conflicts, by smuggling in contraband and committing sexual misconduct against the inmates. Maggots and fly larvae were found numerous times in Aramark’s kitchen in a Michigan prison.

However, when local media attempted to expose Aramark’s shortcomings, they were threatened with lawsuits.

There have been many legal cases over prisons serving food to inmates that was not only appetizing, but dangerous. There are countless issues of food safety that one is likely to encounter in prison, such as falling sick after consuming tainted meat, finding maggots in food, and being served food that has evidence of also being eaten by rats.

This is no longer just an issue of food being unappealing. There are much deeper concerns of how the meals are affecting the overall bodily health of inmates. Safe food is not a luxury; it is a necessity.

Back to Nutraloaf; no one knows exactly what it is, and it’s very likely that each institution that serves it has its own special Nutraloaf recipe. You can find a few potential recipes online, including one titled “Nutraloaf is the Worst Loaf.” It includes dehydrated potato flakes, raisins, non-dairy cheese, tomato paste, beans, milk, spinach, and carrots.

It is often described as bland, tasteless, or “downright disgusting.” It also has been given the nicknames of “confinement loaf,” and “special management meal.” The name of “Nutraloaf” itself was meant to reinforce that the loaf was nutritionally sufficient, albeit unappetizing.

It has been deemed unconstitutional to deny inmates food as punishment, but is legal to give inmates punishment meals, which makes the serving of Nutraloaf and other punishment meals possible, until enough legal concern arises to determine otherwise.

Hutto v. Finney in 1978 determined that the punishment meal, “grue,” served to prisoners in Arkansas was unconstitutional. Grue is quite similar to Nutraloaf, and consists of mashed meat, potatoes, margarine, vegetables, and eggs that were pressed at the bottom of a pan and then cooked.

States including Pennsylvania, Maryland, Nebraska, Illinois, Washington, West Virginia, and New York have served Nutraloaf. When an inmate has been assigned a Nutraloaf diet, they must eat it for all three meals of a day, for weeks and months on end.

Numerous lawsuits have arisen over Nutraloaf, but it takes lots of legal pressure until the state actually rules it unconstitutional. They did not cease serving Nutraloaf at New York State prisons until 2015.

Proper nutrition is a basic human right that incarceration cannot take away. An ideal situation is to have prisoners maintain their own farms, including dairy farms, and grow their own produce. This practice would also give the inmates a sense of accomplishment, and much better nutrition.

Insufficient nutrition and punishment meals can easily turn into yet another way that inmates are dehumanized.