The independent family pizza restaurants of Plumas County are each, in their own way, tenacious, inventive, agile and community-oriented. The owners of the venerable Gumba’s Family Pizzeria of Blairsden have reimagined their business in the wake of a disastrous structure fire. In Greenville, The Grizzly Bite fills a gap in local eateries and has emerged as a much-needed community gathering space. And in Quincy, Leon and Roy’s is coming into its own.
Gumba’s II Go, Blairsden
Matt and Elizabeth Cruse first met in Blairsden in 1985. At the time, Elizabeth worked at Gumba’s, which her father owned from 1981 to 1986, while Matt worked just down the road at the River Pines Restaurant (most recently the Coyote Bar and Grill). After losing touch for nearly 30 years, the couple reconnected. They married and in 2016 returned home to Graeagle.
By 2016, Gumba’s had changed ownership several times, and was operating under the name Anton’s Grille. The owner, Chris David, an old friend, invited Matt and Elizabeth to manage the restaurant. After a few short weeks, they offered to buy the business outright — an offer Chris and Bonnie David quickly accepted. “They wanted to pass their restaurant on to someone who cared,” Elizabeth recalled.
The Cruses’ vision was to return Gumba’s to the place they had known growing up. They remodeled the interior to make it more comfortable, removed some of the televisions, and expanded the beer selection.
“We made it a place that we felt we would want to go to,” said Elizabeth.
A tragic fire
In the early morning of Sept. 15, 2023, the building that housed Gumba’s and The Village Bakery burned down.
The day of the fire, the Cruses called all their employees to let them know not to come into work that afternoon. Since no one had any plans for the evening, they invited the whole staff to their home for dinner. That was the start of a weekly Friday night gathering that lasted two months.
“Gumba’s was a huge community place,” said Matt. “When it burned down the whole community suffered.”
Indeed, there was a groundswell of support for the beloved business. Two fundraisers were held, and all the money went to the employees, Matt said.
As for the Cruses themselves, “we lived in the trauma for a few months,” said Elizabeth. “We were just trying to figure out who we were and what we were doing. … When we lost Gumba’s, we lost everything we had.”
They looked at other vacant restaurant spaces in the area, but all were older and would have required significant work. Besides, it was important to them to stay in Blairsden if possible.
Then, inspiration struck. A few doors down on Bonta Street is the Grizzly Grill, owned by Chris Simone and Randi Collier — and at the northwest end of their building, a small vacant space, perfect for counter service.
“Randi and Chris were there that night, standing next to us when it [Gumba’s] burned down,” Matt recalled. A few months after the fire, Matt dropped by the Grizzly Grill to pick up some paperwork, and started to wonder — what could we do with this space?
The idea for Gumba’s II Go was born.
A fresh vision
A takeout place was a completely different concept from the dine-in restaurant. The original Gumba’s offered pizza, burgers and pasta dishes, but the smaller space could not accommodate all the necessary equipment. They had to choose which parts of the menu to prioritize. They decided to focus on pizza, and added subs as well.
Matt measured the space carefully, as well as each piece of equipment, and planned exactly how to arrange the kitchen. But he neglected to account for how people would move around the space. At the end of the first week, he rearranged everything again.
They’ve become “very good at maximizing every square inch of this space,” said Elizabeth. She describes the new restaurant as “small but mighty.”
On March 6, Gumba’s II Go opened for business.
One of the biggest challenges of reopening was training a brand new staff from scratch. About six months had passed since the fire. The former cooks and servers had all moved on, often with help and support from the Cruses. And it’s a demanding job. Gumba’s was always fast-paced, said Matt. Although Gumbas II Go doesn’t deal with the same volume, since it’s takeout, speed is even more important. “Now we are solid and ready for the summer,” Elizabeth said.
The packaging is another change. They try to use very little plastic for the takeout, instead embracing options like wrapping paper, recyclable cardboard and, when needed, environmentally friendly plastics. Identifying products requires a lot of research, and tends to be more expensive. “It is a bigger cost but we want to be environmentally aware — that’s very important to us,” Elizabeth said.
The hours are also different. The sit-down restaurant remained open till 10 p.m., but it’s rare for customers to order takeout so late. Right now, Gumba’s II Go is open until 7 p.m., and will likely extend its hours to 8 p.m. for the summer months, said Matt.
Some things never change
Lots of things about Gumba’s remain unchanged. The pizza dough recipe is the same as it ever was. The crust gets its distinctive bite from a sourdough starter — jokingly known around Gumba’s as “Steve the starter” — and that is also exactly the same. In a stroke of luck, Matt had been teaching someone to make dough a few days before the fire, and sent him home with a quart of starter. His student brought the jar to the very first Friday night staff dinner, proclaiming “Steve survived!”
Commitment to community also remains unchanged. Both Cruses are Rotarians. They play Santa and Mrs. Claus in Graeagle at Christmas. And, somewhat unusually, they enjoy hiring teenagers for their first jobs, teaching them and helping them build skills for the future. A lot of local kids start out at Gumba’s at 14 and work through high school before going off to college — “and that’s what we want,” said Matt.
“Watching them grow gives to us, too,” adds Elizabeth. “We are very involved in the community and always will be — whether we have Gumba’s or not.”
Looking ahead
Customers miss coming in, sitting down, visiting — and the owners miss spending time with them, too. The Cruses are often asked whether they plan to rebuild the original Gumba’s. In fact, it isn’t their call — although they owned the restaurant, they did not own the building that housed it. They do say they would enjoy seeing a new restaurant at the end of the street, whether it is Gumba’s or not. There is now something of a restaurant row in Blairsden, Matt said, with Grizzly Grill, Bread and Butter, and Smoke Show — and it has been really exciting to see the growth.
Asked about their plans for the future, Matt joked, “the Caribbean.” They hope to retire in about five years, though that may or may not be realistic. Until then, they are open to whatever opportunities may arise.
“We both really enjoy the energy of the summer season,” said Elizabeth. “We are hopeful. We have a good team here; already our life is better.”
“We both really enjoy the energy of the summer season. … We are hopeful. We have a good team here; already our life is better.”
Elizabeth Cruse, Gumba’s co-owner
The Grizzly Bite, Taylorsville
Grizzly Bite opened in its current incarnation just a year and a half ago, in January 2023.
The owners, Cassie Barr and Toby Tolen, are longtime Indian Valley residents, Tolen having grown up in the area and Barr moving to Taylorsville about 17 years ago.
Barr also owns The Spot in downtown Greenville, which opened in August 2022. The food truck hub and outdoor community space at the corner of Crescent Highway and Pine Street was among the early symbols of the community’s recovery when it opened in 2022. But the couple wanted to offer something more consistent and stable as well. Then Barr, who is a real estate agent, saw the Grizzly Bite property among her listings. The restaurant had been vacant for a year at that point. Previously it had been a pie shop for a time and, before that, she estimates it was empty for 10 or 15 years.
The new owners kept the name, but transformed the menu to focus on pizza and burgers. Today, the two most popular items are the Lights Crick Luau pizza and the Western burger.
During the winter season, the Grizzly Bite relies exclusively on local customers. Barr says they are very grateful for the community’s support. In the summer visitors and tourists expand the customer base. Facebook has proven a valuable tool for promotion and communications.
This is the couple’s first restaurant venture. “Never in a million years did I think I was going to run a restaurant,” Barr said.
Challenges of small business ownership
Early on, the Grizzly Bite also served breakfast, but it proved difficult to find enough staff to stay open through the whole day. Barr does see opportunity though: she thinks a restaurant that focused on breakfast alone could be successful in the area.
The biggest challenge so far has been making payroll, says Barr. Running a business in California is expensive. Inflation is also an issue. “The price of everything is going up exponentially every couple of months,” Barr said. She and Tolen want to avoid raising prices, if possible.
Asked if there is anything she wished someone had told her before starting the business, Barr joked, “Don’t do it!” She added that initially, she and her husband had planned to be passive owners, employing a manager to run the business day to day. But they quickly found that it’s hard to be hands-off.
“You have to be present in your business,” she said. “It doesn’t run itself and no one is going to care as much as you do.”
An enhanced outdoor space
One of the great assets of the space is the outdoor dining area, with sheltering shade trees offering a cool and peaceful place to relax in summer. In the future, Barr hopes to redo the outdoor seating and add a small stage for music.
On Sept. 14, the Grizzly Bite will host a community meeting to discuss the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship’s Connected Communities project, which aims to link 15 small towns by trail. The Quincy-Taylorsville connection is expected to be completed this fall, and will be the first entirely single-track leg. SBTS Executive Director Greg Williams says part of the goal is to stimulate the local economy by bringing people onto the main streets of small towns, and to give locals easy access to the forests without the need for a car.
It’s a mission that complement’s Barr’s own. She sees the Grizzly Bite primarily as a gift to the community rather than a money-making venture.
“I would have shut down five times if it weren’t for the fact that I wanted to support the community,” she said.
Leon & Roy’s, Quincy
The newest restaurant in our story, Leon & Roy’s, will turn a year old Aug. 1. Owners Naomi and Derek Vaughn previously ran a Papa Murphy’s franchise in the space for eight years. They grew tired of the corporation, and wanted to be able to put money back into the community, Naomi explained, so they decided to start a restaurant of their own.
Both Vaughns are Plumas County locals. Naomi was born and raised in Quincy; Derek grew up in Greenville. Prior to their Papa Murphy’s franchise, Naomi ran a salon, while Derek worked at Plumas Motor Supply for 16 years.
Papa Murphy’s was their first restaurant experience. In a way it was a good start, says Naomi, since they are so structured. Franchise agreements typically come with a set of strict processes and policies designed to maintain consistency across locations. With almost a decade of experience behind them, starting the new business went fairly smoothly. The most challenging aspect has been getting to understand the rhythms of the business, said Naomi. Before, they were a take-and-bake place. Now they cook the food.
The Vaughns named the restaurant after their two grandfathers. Leon was Derek’s paternal grandfather; Roy was Naomi’s maternal grandfather. They always regretted not using Leon and Roy as middle names for their children, so given the opportunity to open a pizza place of their own, that was the obvious choice. The whole menu, in fact, is named after different family members.
Responding to the market
In addition to pizza, specialties include Hershels (twisted breadsticks, available in sweet and savory options) and Yeti Knuckles (knots of pizza dough with wings and toppings, available only on the weekends). Both are very popular, said Naomi.
The Vaughns have made changes in response to the market, especially to their hours. Originally, they expected to be open Sundays for football viewing, but people just didn’t come, said Naomi.
She adds that, overall, there has been more takeout than they initially expected. In the future, they might consider expanding to a bigger facility with added options like gaming — but that won’t be anytime soon.
Intangible rewards
When they were first starting, everyone warned the Vaughns about how hard it can be to run a business — the food waste, finding and managing employees, theft, and myriad other challenges. But no one mentioned the positives.
“No one told me how rewarding it is,” Naomi said. “It’s satisfying to cook for people and see people happy.”
“It’s satisfying to cook for people and see people happy.”
Naomi Vaughn, Leon & Roy’s co-owner
