NYTimes-Cause-Cafe

Stacey Wohl, second from right, who helped found Cause Cafe, teaching Shannon Young, Susan Schultz and Joseph Modica how to ring up a sale.
Heather Walsh for The New York Times

FORT SALONGA, N.Y. — Cody Stillwagon dreamed of cooking, but he was stuck washing dishes.

Last month, however, Mr. Stillwagon, 19, of East Northport, N.Y., was slicing vegetables and fruits in a professional kitchen. Mr. Stillwagon has autism, which in past jobs kept him at the sink. Now, he works at Cause Cafe, a business on the North Shore of Long Island created to provide jobs and training for adults with cognitive disabilities.

Stacey Wohl, whose daughter and son have autism, started employing people with disabilities through her wholesale coffee line, Our Coffee with a Cause. But when sales slowed, she and her mother, Susan Schultz, decided to open the brick-and-mortar Cause Cafe here. Read more