Long-serving prisoners from across France have teamed up with one of the country's top chefs to produce a book of recipes which its promoters hope will become a reference for impecunious kitchens everywhere.
"I Cook for Myself Alone" contains 100 recipes selected by Marc Haeberlin, who runs the Michelin three-starred l'Auberge de l'Ill at Illhauserm near the German border.
 The prisoners have created imaginative meals on a shoestring |
Among the meal ideas are "salade solitaire," "galette prisonniere aux deux pommes," and the "simplest sponge cake in the world" whose ingredients cost just one euro. The recipes were the best from among 600 sent in from France's 165 prisons as part of a nationwide competition.
The winner - a prisoner in the Normandy city of Caen - proposed "sea-bream with mushrooms on a bed of lettuce." His prize was a television set from the jail authorities.
The book was the brainchild of Claude Deroussent, a doctor at the Ensisheim prison for serious offenders in the Haut Rhin department.
"Inmates are always coming to me for advice about food and diets. So it seemed a good idea to encourage their interest," he said. "In addition to the recipes, we include a section on sensible eating and how to avoid common prison complaints linked to digestion, cholesterol and diabetes."
The prison chefs have to make do with the scantiest of resources. They have neither refrigerators nor ovens, and each contains just one electric plate, one frying pan and one saucepan.
However they can buy most ingredients from prison shops, or ask for parcels from outside. One recipe even calls for ultra-expensive truffles.
 |  They throw together an oven by wrapping a stool in aluminium foil and putting a hot plate at each end. Necessity is the mother of invention  |
Mr Haeberlin said he was highly impressed by the ingenuity of the detainees. "Some of them have incredible technique. They throw together an oven by wrapping a stool in aluminium foil and putting a hot plate at each end. Necessity is the mother of invention," he said.
"Some of the recipes were extremely original. But you could tell that some of them were written by people who knew the business. I suspect there must be a few ex-chefs doing time."
According to Mr Deroussent, the aim of the book is not to get prisoners to supplement or replace their official diet - which is generally adequate - but to treat cooking as a constructive and therapeutic recreation.
"Cooking is highly important in the everyday life of prisons. It helps people to come together and dispel their anxieties. It allows prisoners to dream, to escape a little," he said.
Future chefs
At Ensisheim prison, more than 10 of the 200 inmates have acquired a cookery qualification which should help them find a job when they are released.
Unfortunately the book has not found a commercial publisher but is being distributed by post to prisoners who request it.
"It is a shame because these ideas could be really useful to old people or students. It's a lesson in how to manage on next to nothing," said Mr Deroussent.
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