Munch Café: A Regina restaurant where ability comes first

Step into Munch Café and Catering and the first thing you notice isn’t a mission statement.

It’s the smell. Something warm and savoury hangs in the air. Grilled bread, coffee, soup simmering somewhere just out of sight.

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There’s the low hum of conversation, cutlery against plates, a chair scraping lightly across the floor.

It feels like any other café in Saskatchewan.

At the front counter, a staff member taps through an order on the till. Behind them, another team member plates a dish, checks it, sends it out. A third wipes down a table, glancing up to see if anyone needs anything.

Morrell explained that small, deliberate accommodations have been put in place to help his employees succeed. “On our till, we have a computer system that guides them through how to take the order, to make sure they get all the information every time,” he said. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)

Nothing here asks for special attention.

But if you look closely enough, you start to notice something else.

Rick Morrell, the café’s executive director, puts it plainly: “Munch is a nonprofit that exists to provide employment and training for people with cognitive disabilities.”

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Before this space opened earlier this year, Munch operated as a catering company. That work built a foundation.

“You can teach good skills with catering,” Morrell explained. “You can teach people how to be a good employee and knife skills and food safety.”

But a café added something different. Something more immediate.

“With the restaurant, we can teach short order cooking… expediting food orders… table service and customer service and money skills,” he explained.

“There’s a whole range of skills that the restaurant allows us to teach our team members.”

Rick Morrell is the executive director of Munch Café and Catering. He is a passionate advocate for people with cognitive differences, and speaks highly of each and every member of his staff. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)

Skills that play out in real time, in front of real customers, over and over again.

The idea traces back to 2015. Munch founders Gwen Herman and Emily Tarr wanted to create jobs that were more than placeholders for people with cognitive differences. Work that had variety, challenge and fair pay.

They started with catering because it was manageable. The café came later, once the non-profit had something solid enough to grow from.

Now, 10 team members keep this place moving. Like any workplace, it takes adjustment.

“Every person you work with learns differently,” Morrell said. “So you just have to know your people.”

Aside from operating a busy café, Munch also continues to offer catering in Regina. (Munch Café and Catering/Facebook)

That philosophy shows up in small ways. The till system that guides orders step by step. The consistency in how tasks are structured. The space to get something wrong without it becoming something bigger than it needs to be.

“When they come in, they’re generally pretty guarded,” Morrell noted. But the longer they stay, the more that changes.

“Once they realize that we’re backing them up… that they can make a mistake and we’re just teaching… it’s like a flower opening up.”

And time after time, Morrell witnesses his employees grow in both skills and confidence.

A hesitant voice steadies. Someone who might have stayed in the background starts to take the lead on small things, then bigger ones.

Morrell said the staff at Munch are unique in the fact that they truly operate as a team. “We have each other’s backs,” he said. (Munch Café and Catering/Facebook)

And the work itself holds up.

“The food that we produce and the service that we provide, it’s as good as any restaurant in the city,” Morrell said confidently.

He doesn’t frame it as an exception. Just a standard.

Which brings you back to the room.

People are eating. Talking. Finishing their coffee.

Maybe they know the story behind the café. Maybe they don’t.

But somewhere in the middle of an ordinary visit, there’s a moment where something shifts.

Munch has been around since 2015. It started as a catering business, and has recently expanded into a sit-down establishment. (Munch Café and Catering/Facebook)

“When people come in here to eat, or when they order a catering and they have this high quality experience, they realize… that’s just a person,” Morrell said.

“Not something broken. That’s an interesting, competent person. And I think that kind of opens up people’s eyes.”

Not a label. Not a limitation.

Just someone doing their job well.

Munch employs 10 people with cognitive differences, ensuring they are supported as much or as little as needed to make their work experience a positive one. (Munch Café and Catering/Facebook)

Munch Café and Catering earns your business the same way any good café does. Through the food, the service, the feeling that people care about what they’re doing.

“Stop focusing on the dis. Focus on the ability,” Rick Morrell said, smiling proudly as he watched his team move confidently through the lunch rush.

At Munch, that idea is visible in every order taken, every plate served, every small moment where someone proves that they can do the job.

You just have to be willing to see it.

Munch Café and Catering looks like any other restaurant, but behind the counter is a team of people with disabilities building skills, confidence and careers in a supportive workplace. (Munch Café and Catering/Facebook)