“Food is nos­tal­gic. It can make peo­ple feel at home, feel nour­ished and loved. This is so impor­tant for peo­ple who may be far from home, like some of the stu­dents who study here,” Shahn tells me, the own­er of Treat Me Good Mparn­twe, who have just reopened the Irrarnte Café at the Desert Knowl­edge Precinct. 

We sit in the busy café, alive with an ener­gy that’s been absent while this space has been unoc­cu­pied. Shahn’s team are serv­ing cof­fees and healthy lunch­es to Precinct staff and vis­i­tors, who’ve been miss­ing this social hub and handy caf­feine fix south of The Gap. 

Shahn orig­i­nal­ly met some­one who worked at Desert Knowl­edge Aus­tralia on a plane two years ago, and they told her about the Irrarnte Café. Since then, she’s catered for a few events here. And she’s always thought it would be the ide­al loca­tion to see all the dreams for her busi­ness come to life.

More than a café

And they’re big dreams. It’s not just the café, but an ambi­tion to use food to bring togeth­er the com­mu­ni­ty while giv­ing a help­ing hand and devel­op­ing life skills for those in need.

Her vision has three focal points, spelt out large on a wall of the styl­ish­ly re-vamped café:

Treat Me Good Mparn­twe, her café and cater­ing ser­vice, which will now cater exclu­sive­ly for the Precinct and the events and work­shops that hap­pen here every week. They also work with organ­i­sa­tions like the Nation­al Dis­abil­i­ty Insur­ance Scheme, help­ing those with dis­abil­i­ties learn basic cook­ing skills so they can become more self-sufficient.

The Store House, pro­vid­ing wel­fare out­reach work, and a com­mu­ni­ty kitchen acces­si­ble to every­one. The idea for this start­ed dur­ing the pan­dem­ic, where Shahn worked along­side the Alice Springs Food­bank to pro­vide meals for those in need, even trav­el­ling up to the Top End to sup­port com­mu­ni­ties there.

“We would nev­er turn peo­ple away,” she says.

And she wants to do more. She wants to run work­shops for peo­ple to learn basic cook­ing skills and food preser­va­tion tech­niques to help com­mu­ni­ties who may not have access to refrigeration.

“If anoth­er per­son knows how to care for them­selves, and knows the basics, I have a hope that what we’re doing could help break sys­temic problems.”

Share My Lunch is anoth­er of Shahn’s ini­tia­tives, invit­ing non-prof­its and busi­ness­es to think of oth­ers at lunchtime and pay it for­ward, giv­ing those less for­tu­nate a lunch while they enjoy their own.

Shahn sees her com­mu­ni­ty ini­tia­tives as her pur­pose, her organisation’s goals much big­ger than just a mon­ey-mak­ing enter­prise. She’s even ded­i­cat­ed a wall of the café to posters sport­ing human rights mes­sages and calls to action.

“Join the Rev­o­lu­tion,” one of them says. ​“Change starts with you.”

Sup­port­ing Indige­nous rep­re­sen­ta­tion in hospitality

Shahn’s oth­er pas­sion is get­ting more Indige­nous rep­re­sen­ta­tion in the hos­pi­tal­i­ty space, with a com­mit­ment to hire Indige­nous staff.

“Too often, locals do not get hos­pi­tal­i­ty jobs. We need to see more Blak faces in these roles so they can be role mod­els for young Indige­nous peo­ple,” she says.

She’s cur­rent­ly employ­ing eight staff, sup­port­ed by a NIAA grant, ensur­ing they all have a wrap-around sys­tem of sup­port, which she was care­ful to write into their contracts.

She also has plans to work with the Alice Springs Youth Deten­tion Cen­tre to pro­vide vol­un­teer­ing and work expe­ri­ence opportunities.

The Irrarnte Café is now open Mon­day-Fri­day from 8am-2pm. It will also be open on Sat­ur­days lat­er in the year.

• Find a map of how to find us
• Vis­it the Store House online shop

Make sure to vis­it the Desert Knowl­edge Aus­tralia stall at the Alice Springs Show for your chance to win a $50 café voucher.