
Ramen noodles 'are most valuable US prison commodity', study finds - wallflower
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-37162373
======
danso
Can't believe this article didn't refer to Spread:
[http://www.usprisonculture.com/blog/2012/08/09/making-
spread...](http://www.usprisonculture.com/blog/2012/08/09/making-spread-jail-
food-inmate-creativity-and-social-control/)

> _Finding their jailhouse diet bland, monotonous, and insubstantial, inmates
> in the California penal system invent alternative meals. “Spread,” the
> generic term for these creations, describes the inmate-created foods most
> often built around a single ingredient, instant ramen noodles. Beginning
> with this noodle base, the inmates concoct variations that approximate their
> favorite foods on the outside, often those with distinctive flavorings and
> textures._

~~~
honksillet
On the east coast inmates call these Chichis. Ramen is the base ingredient but
they add whatever they can buy off the commissary carts. Chichis are really
bad for the inmates with hypertension.

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soup10
Pretty sad that we treat caged animals better than people. And just like
abusing a dog doesn't fix behavioral problems, prisons that punish without
rehabilitation don't change people's ways.

~~~
pilsetnieks
Look up factory farming. Zoo animals live in luxury compared to most farm
animals. So no, we don't really treat caged animals better than humans. (Both
situations are despicable, though.)

~~~
soup10
Even animals on factory farms get fed.

~~~
laser
So you'd prefer this to prison?
[https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=factory+farm](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=factory+farm)

:P hahaha .... :( ....

We need a lot more compassion in the world in general. Is there some technique
to make people or the world more compassionate?

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Reason077
Perhaps prisons should consider serving Ramen noodles for some of their meals?

It's hard to imagine anything else is cheaper than dried noodles, especially
when purchased in the sort of bulk quantities that prisons would buy. We're
talking a few cents per meal.

They're easy to prepare and like the article says: "cheap, tasty, and rich in
calories".

~~~
xyzzy123
Not very healthy though, instant noodles are deep fried and usually tons of
sodium.

~~~
Coding_Cat
Making non-instant ramen is pretty easy though, especially if you have to feed
hundreds of people. It basically amounts to making an asian-spiced soup,
throwing in veggies and some soup-meats (or good meat if you're feeling
fancy), maybe an egg or two if you can get them on the cheap and add ramen.

It's still pretty cheap (depending on what you put in of course), and it's not
that bad in terms of nutrients. But hey, it's more expensive than the "bricks
'n goo" they serve these days.

------
sleepychu
> Although the research is based on anecdotal evidence from fewer than 60
> inmates and staff from one male state prison, the author points to other
> findings indicating that the trend toward using ramen noodles for exchanges
> is evident in other prisons.

------
Maultasche
I can confirm this. My wife used to work at a prison in California, and she
told me about ramen being used as currency by the inmates. They would refer to
ramen packets as "soups".

It sounded like the inmates got just enough calories to survive, and often
supplemented their diet by purchasing additional food with whatever money was
given to them by family or was earned through jobs (which paid 10 cents an
hour or something ridiculous like that). Ramen is cheap, has lots of calories,
and lasts a long time, making it very popular.

They also made their own alcoholic concoctions by storing fruit and various
other things in their mouths and spitting it into a plastic bag, letting it
ferment over time. That was referred to as "pruno". Pruno was considered
contraband and would be confiscated upon discovery, so it was hidden in places
like the toilet to prevent discovery. Pruno often turned out to be toxic in
some manner, and sometimes made inmates very sick. It didn't stop them from
making it though.

------
liaukovv
It's the same way in russian prisons

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jgalt212
Per Martin Lawrence and Chris Farley, I always thought it was cigarettes.

[http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/matt-foley-
in-p...](http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/matt-foley-in-
prison/n10551)

~~~
AjithAntony
In case anyone was unsure, no smoking in prison anymore.

------
NoGravitas
I wonder if they are also used as a starch source for pruno (prison wine).

------
jernfrost
Bizarre how Americans never seem to think prisons are bad enough. As long as
there are prisons worse than American ones the prisons are too good. It seems
like the thinking is that if prisons don't get bland or disgusting food, then
they are rewarding crime.

It was actually surprising to read that prisons in my home country Norway,
which are significantly more humane are not really much more expensive than
American ones. There prisoners often get to cook meals themselves. In some
prisons they have their own unit with a proper kitchen. I guess part of the
reason American prisons are relatively expensive despite the horrible
treatment is that they spend so much money on heavy security measures.
Norwegian prisons attempt to create an atmosphere that reduce the propensity
for violent behavior and thus reducing the need for heavy fortifications.

Being humane can actually be cost effective!

~~~
lordnacho
What's particularly annoying to me is that they talk about prison rape as if
it's a natural part of the punishment.

Growing up in Denmark, I recall an incident on the news where someone drove a
bulldozer through the wall of a prison. Only a handful of prisoners actually
ran. The others decided to stay inside.

They are quite happy to do things that will allow prisoners to reintegrate.
For instance, a friend of the family did something quite stupid and ended up
in jail. He was still allowed out on weekends to teach me how to swim. With
supervision of course, but his crime was violent you wouldn't expect someone
with that sentence to be let out in the US system.

The flipside of course is you get a guy like Breivik. He basically gets the
maximum, but for a nutter like him it's almost not even a punishment. He's
like nothing more than his own suite, a playstation, and peace and quiet to
write his ideas.

~~~
douche
With someone like Breivik, who, whether or not what he's done is ever
forgivable, will nevertheless never be allowed to walk free again, what is the
point of locking them up behind bars for the rest of their lives?

The death penalty can be abused, but there are some clear cases where it is
the most reasonable solution. Charlie Manson has been in jail for 45 years;
probably Dzhokhar Tsarnaev will be kept alive for decades as well.

~~~
coldtea
> _The death penalty can be abused, but there are some clear cases where it is
> the most reasonable solution. Charlie Manson has been in jail for 45 years;
> probably Dzhokhar Tsarnaev will be kept alive for decades as well._

And the death penalty is "the most reasonable solution" in those cases
because? It's "too much" to keep people alive?

In that case, maybe don't have a system that gives life sentences with wild
abandon -- e.g. for BS "3 strikes offences", etc., and has the biggest
incarceration rate in the world by a wide wide wide margin.

~~~
douche
No, because these people have done terrible things, and society will not allow
them to be redeemed. Is it more cruel to put somebody in a box for decades, or
put a bullet in their brain and get it over with? I know which I would prefer.

Three strikes laws are idiotic, as are most manifestations of the US criminal
justice system. I object to the knee-jerk reaction that the death penalty is
inherently bad, in all cases, under any circumstances, and if you don't think
so too, you're a terrible, awful, probably racist bigot.

~~~
coldtea
> _No, because these people have done terrible things, and society will not
> allow them to be redeemed._

Society can do much more than we give it credit for. Not all societies hold
primitive eye-for-an-eye beliefs or worse.

> _I object to the knee-jerk reaction that the death penalty is inherently
> bad, in all cases, under any circumstances_

Well, societies that abolished it don't think so. At least their legislators
and majority don't. Outliers will always think whatever they want (and
grieving relatives of victims and such are the last that should be asked in
those matters).

For me the death penalty is not different from things like torture, slavery,
judicial rape, etc. Wrong under any circumstances.

------
contingencies
My startup _Infinite Food_ [0] is building a network of automated food
preparation and retail service locations based upon robotics, with an initial
focus on noodle soups. While we are launching in mainland China, prisons are
one of the network locations that we have in mind for international expansion.
In a prison context, we see a single purpose, locked-down tablet being lent to
prisoners, upon which they can select, customize or create from scratch a meal
from a relatively broad range of fresh ingredients, and their cooked meal
would be ready to eat within a few minutes. Currently raising seed!

[0] [http://8-food.com/](http://8-food.com/)

Edit: Genuinely curious why this has 5 downvotes and no comments? It's on
topic.

~~~
jpatokal
I didn't downvote you, but I presume others did because you're spamming.

Also, the Arabic in your multilingual animation is gibberish, because all the
letters are in their isolated forms.

~~~
contingencies
Hrrm, maybe. I personally wouldn't consider it spamming as it's literally a
startup in the area of noodle soup, which was the subject. Thanks for the tip
though!

~~~
dang
HN users have varying views on what crosses the line into spamming. I think if
your comment had done more engaging with what's intellectually interesting in
the current thread, instead of sounding promotional, it would have done
better. It's also likely that some HN users are sensitive to the issue of
profiting from prisons.

It's fine for established HN users to bring up their projects/products in an
on-topic way, as long as they don't overdo it participate on HN for more than
just that.

