Café 54

Café 54 is a caterer in Tucson, AZ, located on E Pennington St. The business began in 2004 as a restaurant and catering operation, and today it offers a menu spanning featured soups, daily specials, entrees, burgers and sandwiches, and other lunch and dinner fare. Specific items on the menu include Kogi Beef Soup, Potato Green Onion and Cheddar Soup, a French Dip Burger, Caprese Salad, a Hero's Gyro, Chicken Red Curry, a Korean Bowl, a Falafel Wrap, a Poke Bowl, a Veggie Burger, a Classic American Bacon Cheeseburger, a Café 54 Tuna Melt, and a California Club Sandwich. Café 54 holds a rating of 4.70 based on 105 reviews.

Café 54 operates as a program of Coyote TaskForce, a 501(c)(3) non-profit that began in 1992 when a group of Clubhouse members, mental health workers, families, and advocates formed a consumer-run business and were awarded the contract to run Our Place Clubhouse. At Café 54, adults recovering from mental illness receive on-the-job training as cooks, pastry chefs, cashiers, and dishwashers, building toward independent employment in the community. The program's mission is fourfold: assisting individuals with mental illnesses toward becoming independent, tax-paying citizens; providing the local restaurant community with trained, experienced employees; giving trainees tools to express their talents and skills; and reducing the stigma surrounding mental illness by focusing on abilities rather than disabilities. Café 54 has been recognized by University Health Plans as a CORE program, a Center of Rehabilitative Excellence designation honoring its employment services, and CTF is a Qualifying Charitable Organization for the Arizona state tax credit.

The restaurant sits on E Pennington St in downtown Tucson, a short walk from Jácome Plaza and the Pima County Public Library's Joel D. Valdez Main Branch, about a tenth of a mile in either direction. The Fox Theatre, the Arizona Historical Society Downtown Museum, and City High School are all within roughly a tenth of a mile, and East Congress Street runs just to the south.

Two decades in, Café 54 continues to pair a downtown Tucson lunch service with a vocational mission that has placed generations of trainees into restaurant jobs across the community.