Manzanita Connections – March 11, 2025
New! Community Member Spotlight: Connecting With Drew Crossley and Jackie Stuber
I’m delighted to bring you the first in a new series of “Connecting With” interviews.* This is where I get to know someone from the community a little better and share their story with you. Last week I sat down with Drew Crossley and his wife Jackie Stuber. This seemed like perfect timing to introduce (or perhaps re-introduce) the two of them for several reasons. Jackie just finished her third weekend serving sourdough wood-fired pizzas from her new pizza truck, Fornax, located in the food truck pod Under The Big G in Garibaldi. And if you’ve gone into Finnesterre boutique, then you’ve probably met Drew. What you may not know is that Drew is one of this month’s three featured artists at the Hoffman Center for the Arts.
How did you end up in this little corner of our coastal community?
The beach is Drew and Jackie’s vibe, but their story started in Portland where they were introduced by a mutual friend, ironically over pizza. When Drew learned that Jackie had been a pastry chef for 16-18 years, he spent the evening grilling her with questions testing her culinary knowledge. They started seeing each other shortly after that fateful meeting. While living in Portland, they would come to their happy place at the beach a couple times a month. They got married in 2022 in Netarts and decided to move to the beach. They landed in Wheeler in early 2023, after Jackie was hired as a pastry chef at The Salmonberry. And the rest according to Drew was, “bada bing.” Drew found work at Finnesterre in Manzanita, and they found community and connection almost instantly. The folks at Salmonberry helped them find a place to live, and they quickly met a group of friends ready to lend a hand and offer support.
What do community and connecting with the community look like to you?
Involved is the one-word description that Jackie and Drew settled on. If you get involved, community will come. And it seems that involvement and enthusiasm are contagious here. They found that if you tell people you want to do something, like start a business, they want to be a part of it.
“Encouraging other people in the community to make something for themselves, to be part of it and to do better – it’s what we have here,” says Jackie.
For example, Jackie brought up her idea of having a pizza truck to Jared Gardner at Nehalem River Ranch and he immediately jumped to figuring out how to help her make it happen. “He offered to store the trailer, haul it back and forth, and he’s storing my firewood for me,” said Jackie. “He was so supportive and encouraging. I didn’t even have to ask.” So naturally, the sausage on the sausage and mushroom pizza is from Nehalem River Ranch.
Drew found the same reaction when he shared his art. “I mentioned my art and people popped off opportunities, resources, and suggestions for shows I should enter. It makes you want to get involved with them and what’s going on in the community.”
Drew and Jackie say they feel connected to the coast cause “it’s our vibe.” They also commented that people here aren’t caught up in corporate life. People they’ve met seem more balanced, they’re more relaxed, and therefore have the time and desire to get involved and support each other.
How else do you spend your time living in the Nehalem valley?
Life in the Nehalem valley near the beach is how Jackie and Drew want to be living. They like a slower pace, the focus on nature, walks on the beach and in the forest. Crabbing, clamming and foraging are their vibe. They don’t like streetlights.
Besides running the pizza truck and feeding “Sam” (her sourdough starter) every day, Jackie really likes foraging. That could mean combing the beach after a storm for buoys and seashells or hunting for a piece of washed-up ceramic tile from the days of Sir Francis Drake. She’ll go golfing with Drew and walk the course foraging for porcini mushrooms or picking huckleberries for muffins and pancakes.
In addition to working at Finnesterre and golfing, Drew likes to repurpose things and create collage/mixed media art. He sees the opportunity in a pile of golf tees, corks, wooden tiles, pieces of metal, or other 3-dimensional objects, and immediately thinks about how he could make something. In another nod to pizza, a pizza paddle hangs on their wall that they decorated with a myriad of beads, pins, old buttons and Drew’s grandma’s jewelry to look like a pizza with toppings. Currently, the idea of creating a mosaic on Jackie’s pizza oven is swirling around in their heads.
Meet Jackie: Owner of Fornax, Roman goddess of bakers and ovens
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Jackie says, “A good pizza is all about the crust … and a good crust has a balance of fermentation and hydration.” Jackie is the owner and crust aficionado behind the new Fornax pizza truck in Garibaldi serving wood fired pizza with wild fermented dough and locally sourced toppings. Fornax is open Fridays through Mondays from 3:00 - 7:00 pm.
Jackie’s interest in culinary arts and her Type A personality led her to earning a degree in Baking and Pastry Arts from Johnson & Wales University in Rhode Island. She’s been making pizza dough for over 15 years. When Salmonberry shut down (last year), she worked at Sea Level in Cannon Beach briefly before taking some time for herself to intentionally think about her future. Her research included looking at various pizza ovens and trailers, and paid off when she found the used trailer that is now Fornax—which already had a mixer and refrigeration allowing her to do all her food prep on the trailer.
The community connection is strong. Jackie especially likes being part of the Under the Big G food community. The Fornax logo was designed by Sandstone Stories. Jackie is currently sourcing pizza toppings from Josi Farms, Wild Foragers NW, Fraga Farmstead Creamery and Nehalem River Ranch. She plans to use Moon River Farm, Kingfisher Organics and Murrelet Herb Farm in the summer. Her partner-in-pizza is Charles Lutka (formerly the head chef at Salmonberry). Jackie says she and Charles have a common goal: Better food on the North Coast.
I too am always searching out the best food on the coast. My husband and I had fun tasting Fornax pizza with friends a couple weekends ago. We shared the Sausage & Mushroom topped with arugula (highly recommend), and the Fornax Hawaiian (cause I’m team pineapple on my pizza). Then just yesterday I had the Margarita, shamelessly eating half of it while I was driving back to Manzanita. I felt like the simplicity of the Margarita pizza allowed me to really taste the crispy crust and appreciate its lovely chew. Follow Jackie on Instagram to stay updated!
Meet Drew: Artist and familiar face at Finnesterre
When Drew was looking for work, the creative in him was drawn to the Manzanita boutique Finnesterre. Upon meeting the owner Ann Maizel and looking around at the store merchandise, Drew felt like it was a natural fit and a fun place to be. I can personally vouch for the fun quotient at Finnesterre with Ann and Drew (now the store manager) greeting you when you walk in.
A side benefit of working at the boutique for Drew has been meeting local artists whose work Ann brings into the shop. Drew says it’s been motivating and inspiring to meet the artists and get involved in the artist community. Drew studied fine art at Oregon State University but only recently identified collage as his preferred mode of expression — and now has his first showing at the Hoffman Center.
Drew became interested in collage when he realized he could use the colors, textures and shapes from magazines as his paint or medium. Part of the reason his show is called “One Thing Leads to Another” is that he starts with a few pieces and lets it organically unfold from there. “I’m trying to meld, put together the seemingly unconnected, and make a scene by connecting pieces.” A major part of Drew’s artistic philosophy is trusting the process. He makes connections that lead to the next, and the next, and so on until a scene or dreamscape unfolds.
Now that Drew has introduced his art to a wider audience, he wants to keep going and is creating more with the mindset of showing.
You can view his premiere gallery show, titled “One Thing Leads to Another” at the Hoffman Center, through March 29 (Thursdays–Sundays from 12:00 - 5:00 pm). Drew also will be leading a Content, Color and Collage workshop on March 15 and 16 at the Hoffman Center.
* Note: I hope to publish a “Connecting With” piece about every six weeks but we’ll see how it unfolds! Please do send me your suggestions for who to interview or let me know if you would like to be featured yourself!
Great article Angie! Drew & Jackie are great members of our community 🤩🍕
Great info, thank you! 💗