# How do prisoners make alcohol in jail? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 17, 2004, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584 "2004-04-17T23:16:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2016, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/41 "2016-07-15T11:20:23Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > How do these rigs ensure ethanol (aka ‘grain alcohol’) instead of methanol (aka ‘wood alcohol’)? > I was under the impression that the heat at which the mash is cooked determined this for your basic moonshine The heat at which the mash is fermented is one factor in determining how much methanol you get. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/42 "2016-07-16T02:21:29Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Wines are not distilled. ETA: But, wait, is Mad Dog fortified? So, maybe, but I would suspect that cheap grain spirits industrially distilled would be careful to keep the methanol content down. Yeah, I was thinking of fortified wines like MD20/20, Night Train, and Thunderbird. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/43 "2016-07-16T02:31:56Z")
> [@Hypno-Toad](#): > > Yeah, I was thinking of fortified wines like MD20/20, Night Train, and Thunderbird. Sure. I just doubt that they’re fortifying it with methanol or poorly distilled alcohol or anything of the sort. I assume they just get some cheap Everclear-type grain alcohol and throw it in the mix. ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2016, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/44 "2016-07-16T03:04:00Z")
Here’s one for anyone who would like to try the play at home version that requires no dirty socks. Or toilets. (Warning: 20 min long video) [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/RWGxmdtybs0/hqdefault.jpg "How to make Inmate Brew (Must be of drinking age)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWGxmdtybs0) ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2016, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/46 "2016-12-01T22:49:56Z")
Serve with Spread: 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. Kermit Sanders, an inmate at San Francisco County Jail 5, or cj5, as it is known for short, describes the culture of spread: "I learned about spreads when I came to prison. Spread consists of institutional canteen commissary food items. Basically soups. Top Ramen noodles. And then from there you go to the other stuff: tuna, beef, chicken, tamales, herrings. And different things like that. You got chili-bean spreads, you got tamale spreads, you got seafood spreads. My favorite is Going-Down-South Hog Spread. You take pig skins. On the average, when I fix spread for just me and someone else, I would take two bags of pork skins, two bags of jalapeño pretzels, four beef sticks, and I would take a big bag of Cheese Crunchies. I would grind all that down with the Top Ramen, and I call that Down-South spread, ’cuz it’s full of pork… [Full article: ““Breaking Bread with a Spread” in a San Francisco County Jail,” Sandra Cate, _Gastronomica: The Journal of Food and Culture, Vol. 8, No. 3 (Summer 2008), pp. 17- 24_](http://www.usprisonculture.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/prisonfood.pdf) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2016, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/47 "2016-12-02T00:34:43Z")
If these guys can make tasty meals (well, tastier than the normal prison fare, at least) with cheap ingredients available on the inside, why not make it official and give them jobs in the prison kitchen? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2016, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/48 "2016-12-02T01:17:52Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#): > > Yes. That’s what alcoholism is, a desperate desire for it. In fairness, incarceration might cause the most temperate of people to seek an escape through intoxication. The only reason that prisoners make alcohol is the reason why alcohol was the first drug invented: it’s easy. An alcoholic cannot ever drink enough. Mixing up some toilet mash isn’t exactly how true alcoholics do things. I’m not saying that these guys are not alcoholics, its just that drinking nasty prison booze doesn’t necessarily make one an alcoholic. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2016, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/49 "2016-12-02T02:48:50Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > If these guys can make tasty meals (well, tastier than the normal prison fare, at least) with cheap ingredients available on the inside, why not make it official and give them jobs in the prison kitchen? A number of cases have arisen regarding a particular prepared food stuff widely served to prisoners in solitary confinement. Eg, [Nutraloaf](http://www.ladybud.com/2013/06/14/the-politics-of-nutraloaf-what-its-like-to-eat-in-prison/): Recipe courtesy of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections: Recipe makes 21 servings. 10 ½ cups reduced fat milk, 2% 26 ¼ cups white rice, cooked 5 ¼ cups potatoes, grated raw, flesh and skin 5 ¼ carrots, grated 5 ¼ cabbage, shredded 15 ¾ cups oatmeal, dry 15 ¾ cups garbanzo beans, with liquid, mashed 1 ½ cups margarine Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients thoroughly in mixing bowl. Place paper liners in loaf pans, scale 29-30 oz. of batter into lined loaf pan. Bake for one hour and 15 minutes. Place on wire rack and cool thoroughly. Similar-in-style recipes, 1 meat, 1 vegetarian, are printed [in this court document](http://www.illinoiscourts.gov/opinions/appellatecourt/2001/4thdistrict/october/html/4000895.htm) after inmates sued the director of the dept. of corrections claiming, among other things, cruel and unusual punishment. In 2015 NY Prison menus were challenged as well;[New York Prisons Take an Unsavory Punishment Off the Table](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/18/nyregion/new-york-prisons-take-an-unsavory-punishment-off-the-table.html) has other references and a recipe. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2016, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584/50 "2016-12-02T02:49:09Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > If these guys can make tasty meals (well, tastier than the normal prison fare, at least) with cheap ingredients available on the inside, why not make it official and give them jobs in the prison kitchen? Where do you think they’re “acquiring” a lot of the ingredients for these spreads? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-prisoners-make-alcohol-in-jail/240584.md?page=2)