Pizza in Atascadero comes with house-made mozzarella if you hit the right spot.
That would be Lebber’s on Traffic Way, which is coming up on its first turn around the sun on Oct. 1. While that may be its first anniversary in downtown A-Town, Lebber’s has been a part of North County’s cuisine scene since 2021, when it started pulling pizzas out of the oven next to Hubba Wines in Tin City, squeezing succulent mozzarella, dipping savory-sweet ricotta, and shredding stracciatella.
All of those handmade house cheeses make their way onto Lebber’s pizzas alongside farm-fresh local ingredients that are subject to change, just the way Caleb Salisbury likes it.
“Three-quarters of the menu fluctuates, a quarter is probably more permanent. It’s very seasonal right now,” Salisbury said. “We are as local as we can possibly be.”
Savor the flavor
Lebber’s is open Wednesday through Saturday at 5934 Traffic Way in Atascadero. Enjoy wine and snacks from 2 to 4 p.m. The pizza kitchen is open from 4 to 8:30 p.m. Visit lebberspizza.com for a sneak peek at what’s cooking.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Salisbury made some life changes that eventually led to Lebber’s. The restaurant his family had owned in La Habra for 41 years—The Cat and the Custard Cup—closed for good, so Salisbury headed to Paso Robles to help out with the wine harvest at Denner Vineyards.
Prior to that pandemic-instigated closure, Salisbury had the opportunity to run the kitchen for a couple of years after sous-cheffing for his father. Focused on fine dining at the family restaurant, which he described as “butter with a good backbone” (French-influenced California cuisine), Salisbury was used to working with fresh produce.
“Being from LA and seeing all the farm names and then moving up here and realizing that all of those farms are pretty much on the Central Coast,” Salisbury said. “It’s kind of crazy, there’s so many farms here.”
Lebber’s has developed relationships with those farmers and other local purveyors, including fishermen. Links to places like Munak Ranch in Paso show up on Salisbury’s menu. Made up of pizza, small plates, and salads, the rotating dishes reflect local products, his fine-dining background, and a lot of playfulness.
Munak melon and fennel come with sumac pistachios. Munak sun gold tomatoes top the Sunshine pizza alongside housemade mozzarella, garlic, Parmesan, basil, and extra virgin olive oil.
“We’re trying to go for very approachable but still elevated food in a casual environment,” he said. “A little more freedom and not so much seriousness that comes with fine dining.”
With pizza, you can’t be too uptight, Salisbury said. And alongside the pies, he tries to include bright flavors with the small plates while keeping things simple and fun.
The barramundi crudo comes with calamansi (a small, very sour citrus fruit from the Philippines) aguachile, satsuma plum (a Japanese blood plum), Meyer lemon kosho (a Japanese fermented paste), and lime leaf. The Cheezer—aka cheese pizza—is topped with tomato sauce, house mozzarella, garlic, Parmesan, caciocavallo (a Southern Italian cheese), and Sicilian oregano.
During the Denner harvest, he met his now-wife, Kacee Fox, who works at Saxum Vineyards.
“I had about a month left of harvest when we met, and we built a pretty strong relationship in a month, strong enough for me to stay,” Salisbury said.
Fox now makes Lebber’s house wines under her Arza label, thanks to a little encouragement from the winemaker/owner at Saxum. Those include a lighter, high acid chardonnay from the coast; a grenache-dominant red blend; and an Avila rosé.
“That was super fun to get pushed into that, and it’s been really cool to see it selling,” Salisbury said.
Fox continues to work full time at Saxum and give her all to Lebber’s, something that Salisbury said they’re trying to find a better balance with.
But the duo has given their all to this whole pizza and plates thing since Lebber’s popped up at Hubba’s with a butcher paper menu and a portable pizza oven using a derivative of Salisbury’s childhood nickname (Leb) as the business name.
“It was a really beneficial, cost-effective way to start out,” Salisbury said with a laugh. “It was kind of an accident, but it’s been working out very well.”
For three years, Lebber’s was able to build a pretty loyal customer base, he said, and those eaters followed them to Atascadero. It meant that the brick-and-mortar restaurant was busy right out the gate.
The customer base has been consistent and kept things busy, he said, making it a little harder to dial in the things that might need some tweaking.
“I guess I know there’s still work to be done around this spot,” Salisbury said. “The restaurant’s been plenty busy, and we’re still playing catch up.”
Menu items that started at Hubba’s still grace Lebber’s tables, and he often brings popular seasonal dishes back into the rotation. The tomatoes and potatoes with aji whipped feta, pickled red onion, and basil is a frequent flyer.
While Lebber’s doesn’t have daily specials, the menu changes often enough that it’s not difficult to insert a fresh dish into what’s cooking.
“We have a small menu so if we want to do something different, we just put something on and take something off,” he said.
Keep up with menu changes @lebberspizza on Instagram, where the food is fun and the posts are a vibe. ∆
Editor Camillia Lanham is ready to eat all the things on Lebber’s menu. Reach her at clanham@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Aug 20-27, 2026.
