Vintage Alcatraz menu rivals Masterchef fare

Split Pea Soup, Baked Meat Croquettes, Puree Mongole and Beef Pot Pie Anglaise.

As food-related programmes conspire to pique the public’s interest in all things culinary, you might think the last place people will look to for recipe inspiration is to a prison kitchen.

While the dishes mentioned above might have been taken from a Masterchef carte du jour they feature instead on a 1946 menu from San Francisco’s notorious Alcatraz prison.

Traditional prison fare might conjure images of cockroach-infested plates, stale bread, cold porridge and mouldy cheese but the grub served to prisoners in Alcatraz during the week September 2nd - September 8th, 1946,  would not look out of place on the menu pages of any modern-day restaurant.

The medley of victuals on offer shows a surprising degree of nutritional diversity and includes Roast Shoulder of Pork for dinner on Monday, Purée Mongole and Chilli Con Carne served with Lettuce Salad and Steamed Rice for supper on  Tuesday while Chowder, Breaded Rock Cod, Bacon Jambalaya and Zucchini Sauté made the plate on other days.

While the prison menu does not feature Cypress Grove Goat Cheese Burger or Boiled Short Ribs with Horseradish Sauce as offered by one San Francisco hotel as part of a special commemorative Alcatraz dinner menu,  it might go some way towards explaining why not one prisoner escaped from the island prison.

The 1946 menu was posted by San Francisco Chronicle restaurant blog Inside Scoop SF to coincide with an Alcatraz exhibition in the city's Embarcadero Center.

Happily, the recipes used before the prison closed in 1963 may not be lost as artefacts on display in the exhibition include a cookbook that Alcatraz Women’s Club sold to families on the island.