ALFRED, Maine – The scent of cinnamon wafted through the air of the kitchen at York County Jail in Alfred, as vast trays of coffee cake baked in the ovens.
There was a cameraman present, recording what was happening.
And what was happening goes on here three times a day, seven days a week – meal preparation for jail residents, all 240-plus of them.
On a late September weekday morning, News Center Maine meteorologist Aaron Myler was on hand to help food service staff and volunteer trustee residents make the coffee cake and top it with the signature cinnamon sugar mixture, along with other aspects of breakfast making and serving.
The camera folks were filming Myler Makes It, an occasional piece that looks at food made in Maine and much more..
“It’s a series in which I learn how to bake, create or try a new skill from the masters of their craft,” said Myler. “We’ve done everything from cooking at the best restaurants to baseball with the Sea Dogs, and now I’m baking with these residents…..I try to keep up with them, which doesn’t always happen.”
Myler’s jail piece takes note that the trustee residents are building skills for the future.
On the breakfast menu that Wednesday was, in addition to coffee cake, scrambled eggs, hash browns, oatmeal, juice and milk. Oftentimes, said Sheriff William King, the food sounds somewhat bland, but it meets nutritional guidelines set by the American Correctional Association.
The object? To make it well, plate it on a tray and get it to the jail residents who call the various cellblocks home.
The kitchen is operated by staff employed by Aramark Correctional Services, with help from about 13 trustee inmates split between morning and afternoon shifts, building skills for when they leave the facility. Sentenced trustee workers earn “good time” of 1 ½ days off their sentence for each 48 hours they spend in the kitchen; those who are pretrial or awaiting sentencing earn commissary credits.
Myler said he enjoys filming “Making it with Myler,” and found the jail kitchen program interesting.
“It’s helping people get off on the right foot,” he said of the trustee volunteers who work in the kitchen, many of them enrolled in Aramark’s IN2WORK program, which provides instruction and more. “They’re prepared for work on the outside.”
Indeed, later that day, five of the kitchen trustees graduated from the IN2WORK program, earning a managerial ServSafe certificate, issued by the National Restaurant Association.
As for breakfast prep, it begins early, around 4:30 a.m.
Coffee cake batter was poured out onto the baking pans, then the residents, accompanied by Myler, applied the mix of sugar and cinnamon before tucking the pans into the oven to bake.
Workers had already made the oatmeal, the scrambled eggs were ready, and the hash brown patties were pulled out of the ovens.
Earlier, one of the jail residents had already made preparations for those who, for various reasons including food allergies and on religious grounds, must refrain from eating certain foods – a job the inmate takes seriously, jail officials said.
Once all the breakfast components were ready, the volunteers, Aramark employees, and Myler, kitchen utensils in hand, began to fill the trays. It was an organized, slick effort. Once filled and covered, the insulated trays were loaded onto carts, where the trustees would deliver them to residents.
The York County Jail kitchen program piece was scheduled to air on Friday morning, Oct. 11, and if you missed it, the videos are set to appear on the News Center Maine website under the Myler Makes It section.
King and Interim Jail Administrator Major Lori Marks watched it all happen.
King pointed out that both the jail and the volunteers benefit from their work in the kitchen: the jail saves by employing fewer kitchen workers and the trustees earn skills that help them prepare for work on the outside.
“This is a good program,” said King, “and we’re glad Aaron Myler was here to help us highlight it.”
Photo info: Aaron Myler, right, of the News Center Maine program Myler Makes It, recently visited York County Jail in Alfred and worked alongside trustee residents who volunteer in the kitchen, making coffee cake, assembling other breakfast components, and getting a sense of the skills the residents learn. Here, kitchen crew members take the assembly line approach to filling about 240 breakfast trays, which they then delivered to the cellblocks.