Get to know
the munch team

We are a community led social enterprise based in Winchester, Hampshire.

our mission: Empowering Communities
Through Food & Nutrition

We are a community-led social enterprise based in Winchester, Hampshire, dedicated to bringing people together through food, nutrition, and fitness.

Our services include personalised events catering across Hampshire, Wiltshire, and The New Forest, as well as a variety of programmes such as cooking demonstrations, one-to-one cooking lessons, personalised nutrition consultations, personal training, community fitness sessions, and inclusive community cooking workshops.

At the heart of what we do is a belief that everyone should have access to healthy food and feel empowered to lead happier, healthier lives. We are passionate about reducing health inequalities, empowering communities, and inspiring individuals to make sustainable, plant-based changes to their diet and lifestyle.

All profits from our events catering and personalised services are reinvested into our community programmes. Our flagship Community Cooking programme offers fun, inclusive workshops for families, young people, and adults with learning disabilities. These sessions, available both online and in person, aim to remove the fear of cooking while helping participants build the skills, confidence, and knowledge they need to cook from scratch, adopt sustainable cooking habits, strengthen financial resilience, and reduce food waste.

Nothing brings people together like good food

– Unknown

Food Ethos

We follow a “towards plant-based” ethos in our catering, nutrition advice, and cooking lessons, encouraging reduced meat and dairy consumption while adding more vegetables and fibre. This approach benefits the environment, supports better health, and is often more cost-effective. We aim to make sustainable eating practical, affordable, and accessible for everyone.

We prioritise British, in-season produce and goods transported by sea while composting all food waste either on-site or industrially. Through our Community Cooking programmes, we help people develop skills to cook from scratch with healthy, sustainable ingredients, moving away from processed foods and excess packaging.

meet the team

Mary Needham

Director

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Mary (MSc, RNutr) is a public health nutritionist and personal trainer, with level 4 esercise referral and specialism in exercise for weight management and type two diabetes.
She is highly experienced in developing healthy eating cooking interventions in schools and community settings; encouraging behaviour change and achieving exceptional outcomes around improved health, confidence, social inclusion, autonomy. and personal empowerment.
These outcomes are also reflected in the numerous client success stories she has had as a personal trainer and personal nutritionist.
Mary also has over 15 years of experience in high volume restaurant operations, including senior management for Jamie Oliver Restaurants. Mary leads all of our Community Programmes as well as heading up Munch Nutrition, Cooking & Fitness;

Denzil Carlton

Director

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Denzil has over 20 years of experience in catering and hospitality, both in and out of the kitchen, including in high end operations and running his own businesses.
He is mainly to be found in the kitchen, experimenting with flavours and creating new, mouth-watering dishes for our lovely customers.
Denzil leads all our events catering team and can also be found delivering food demonstrations and private cooking classes.

Nikki Prentice-Jones

Voluntary Director

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When Mary and Denzil said Munch were looking for a voluntary Director, I jumped at the chance! I’ve been the lucky recipient of Munch’s fabulous food on many occasions and it’s quite simply superb!
I have been involved with social enterprises for the last 7 years, latterly as Head of the School for Social Entrepreneurs in Hampshire. When this came to an end in May this year, I wanted to be involved with a local, growing social enterprise delivering a high quality product & service whilst at its core, making a difference to better the lives of others in the community.
I very much respect Mary and Denzil’s drive, vision, ideas, amazing skills and passion for what they do. I have over 25 years’ experience in business development, strategic direction, project management and coaching across Corporate, small medium enterprises and the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector. Enabling others to reach their goals to make a positive difference in their own lives and in their wider community gets me out of bed in the morning! It’s exciting to help enable changemakers who are tackling complex social & environmental problems and designing innovative solutions.
This is what Munch CIC is about and I am excited to have the opportunity to support them as their journey goes from strength to strength.

Sarah Pawson

Voluntary Director

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I was born and grew up into a sporting family in Sevenoaks, Kent. I spent my family holidays fishing in Scotland, which gave me my love of walking and the outdoors.
During my career as a teacher, I taught in Nursery to Year 6 and had many roles in schools, including many years in senior management, Deputy Head, Assistant Head, Key Stage leader, Inclusion Lead, SENCo and lead literacy teacher in two London Boroughs. Passionate about inclusion and vulnerable families, I have always worked in schools where supporting this was a key part of our work.
I now lives in Dorset, with my husband Eian, where I worked in a small split site Church of England school, working on both sites in Winfrith and Lulworth before retiring at the end of August 2022.
I have taken up wild swimming, we have an allotment, I love walking and my garden!
I am pleased to be able to apply my varied experience working with children, families and disadvantaged groups, together with my passion for seasonal food and sustainable nutrition to help move Munch into the next chapter.

Events Catering Staff

We’re proud to have an incredible team of events staff and believe in treating them the way we’d like to be treated. We provide fair, above-industry-standard pay, paid food breaks where they can enjoy our delicious food, and transport to and from events.

We prioritise comprehensive team training, covering everything from service standards to health, safety, and allergen awareness, ensuring excellence in every aspect of our work.

Our vision is a world where everyone has access to good, healthy food. Our operations hub is run by our core of four directors, each offering individual skillsets, knowledge and experience, which combine to drive the Munch vision forward.

Our Volunteers

Volunteers, as they say, are awesome and we couldn’t do it without them!

We have a wide range of volunteers from all different backgrounds and we find that, no matter what their motivation for volunteering is – whether it’s building their skillsets, gaining industry experience or giving back to their communities – they all get something personally beneficial from the hours they give to us.

We are proud of our relationship with Winchester Go LD, helping us to provide volunteering opportunities for adults with learning disabilities.

We are also very lucky to be able to work closely with Winchester College, who regularly send students to help with our Grub Club.