What does “Go back on the loaf” mean?

Solution 1:

When a prisoner in many US jails is punished by being "put on the loaf", he or she is, for a period, deprived of variety at meal times, and is served a type of meat loaf. The practice has been legally challenged by prisoners who allege that it is "cruel and unusual punishment", which is forbidden by the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution.

On Christmas Day, the inmates at Santa Cruz County Jail will get a welcome respite from their regularly scheduled, nutritious but mostly unexciting high school cafeteria-style meals — glazed ham with sweet potatoes and ice cream for dessert.

If an inmate has been behaving poorly, however, while all his incarcerated compatriots dine on one of the few special meals of the year, he will instead be forced to feast on “the loaf.”

Otherwise known as the disciplinary diet loaf, prison loaf and management loaf, when all else fails in disciplining an inmate — be it loss of visits, free time or other privileges — the deputies turn to this bland log of meat and vegetables to get the disruptive inmate to follow the rules.

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