JM: How many meals did you get per day? Jeffery: Two hot meals a day; breakfast and lunch. One bagged meal for
dinner at 4pm. Serena: we received 3 meals per day. Gary: Breakfast
Lunch
Dinner
JM: How would you rate the food? Please give details of why. Jeffery: Excellent. From what i have heard fellow inmates say about any
other institution they've been to our food was amazing. Even the
guards and other staff would eat certain meals. The meal i ate on
my first day, which happened to be Thanksgiving, was well above
average. Turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, rolls with real
butter and cranberry sauce. Not what i expected at all. Serena: as ive said before the food in el dorado county is
good for jail food compared to san francisco county
jail. the food had a lot of variety and appeared to
be home cooked and not institutional and the soups
and think actually had flavor and vegetables and
things like that. Gary: Well, this was the biggest fear for me. I have my
Bachelor's degree from Le Cordon Bleu, so food to
me is very important. I was beyond scared when I
got there, thinking it was going to be 'slop'.
If i was to rate it as opposed to other jails and
what I've heard out there, Lake Tahoe gets at
least an 8 or even 9.
To rate it for the real world, I would still give
it a solid 6.
JM: Did you have any favorite/least favorite meals? Jeffery: My favorite meal hands down was the biscuits and gravy they served
every friday. Sometimes when the kitchen accidentally had too many
trays of it during my stay in the worker pod, we would enjoy two or
even three helpings. Serena: the soups were very good, i liked the turkey
vegetable soup. breakfast was the worst meal but it
wasnt too bad. Gary: Enchiladas were by far the best thing we got in
there on "Mexican Monday"...we also got things
like Pulled Pork Sandwiches, Burgers, Pasta, Mac &
Cheese with Ham, it's safe to say that LUNCH is
the best meal you'll get in there.
Breakfast was on the same menu weekly:
Monday-Oatmeal
Tuesday-Pancakes
Wednesday-Cream of Wheat
Thursday-Cold Cereal
Friday-Oatmeal
Saturday-Chicken & Waffles
Dinners in there sucked though! Sandwiches with
"Must-GO" soup. Working in the kitchen, I never
ate what the inmates had to eat for dinner. But it
would be shit like peanut butter (NO jelly),
bologna, turkey, ham, pastrami, sometimes we would
make them grilled cheese/pastrami.
Here is the key: KITCHEN WORKER! You literally get
WHATEVER you want to eat. Most breakfast's, I
would make a 3 egg omelet with fresh veggies and
sausage/bacon, lunch was usually a big garden
salad with grilled chicken and Italian dressing,
dinners was usually whatever the inmates had for
lunch, I would just eat it instead of a sandwich. lol.
JM: Were there any other snacks offered outside of meals? What was commissary like and how expensive was it? Jeffery: Commissary was a rip off but you really cant price shop in jail so
people with good families or people with money on their books
would go crazy and buy like 30 candy bars or 50 top ramen soups.
My beef was with the price of paper products and pencils. Serena: there were no snacks outside of regular meals.
commissary was pretty expensive, over a dollar
twenty five for a candy bar. to get it you filled
out a scantron form and then received your
commissary like a few days later. Gary: There is commissary. It's a total rip off though!
My suggestion, get enough $$ for commissary to get
your coffee and some LIGHT snacks, but don't over
indulge. I saw some guys in there ordering $75 a
week (max) and eating it all. One dude I heard was
in H pod, he gained 75lbs in 3 months. HORRIBLE!!!!