FRUITA • For his first shift at Hot Tomato eight years ago, Aaron Knapp was told to wear a costume.

“I was just like, is this a prank? Are they hazing me?” he recalls. “I wore a costume, and sure enough, everybody was in weird stuff.”

Knapp now owns the pizzeria that is as culturally ingrained as mountain biking around here. Riders come from afar for the cherished singletrack webbing this western Colorado canyon country — and they can’t leave without a slice from Hot Tomato.

In Fruita, the tiny outpost near Grand Junction, the pizza has left customers stunned, startled, as if they’ve hucked another rock or zipped downhill again. It’s a crispy, hearty crust at the end of a thin bed of fresh veggies and meats from local farms. It’s a true taste of New York, the originators have proudly said.

That’s Jen Zeuner and Anne Keller, the couple who opened the joint in 2005. Their bike-riding, pizza-making story was chronicled in a short documentary by Patagonia.

“There’s this Susan B. Anthony quote about riding bikes,” Zeuner says in the film. “Something like, the best invention to emancipate women was the bicycle, because it gave people freedom. And I know when I was a teenager stuck in my own skin, trying to figure out who the hell I was, especially diving into the gay thing in a Catholic, Italian family in New Jersey … I would just go ride my bike.”

She and her partner moved to Fruita around the turn of the town’s cycling revolution. In the film, Zeuner reflects on the pizzerias of her home as places of comfort. They were places where “you knew everybody who worked there, and everybody was really nice to you,” she says. “For me, that was a really important piece. And I was like, ‘How do you take that and create that?’”

More than for visiting mountain bikers, Hot Tomato was built for those who called Fruita home. It was built to be a place where everyone could feel welcome and important. Not just the customers, but the staff, too.

Part of the business’s mission statement is to “offer our employees a place where they can grow and thrive.” Beyond financially — they’ve been given competitive wages, retirement matches, medical stipends and knowledge-building access to expense and revenue records — workers have expressed gratitude for something soul-boosting here.

That includes Knapp, who took over last year. (Zeuner and Keller have recently been biking all around Colorado while conceptualizing a project meant to shed light on the state’s housing crisis).

When he moved to the area for mountain biking in 2014 and started at Hot Tomato, Knapp thought he wouldn’t be around long. He thought maybe he’d go back to Indiana, where he got a business degree and where his family owned a business.

But at Hot Tomato, he found something special.

“I’ve seen the way it’s impacted staff’s lives,” Knapp says. “That thing that (Zeuner and Keller) built, I just want to keep that rolling.”

So yes, the occasional costume parties continue. A certain camaraderie that comes from everyone cleaning bathrooms and washing dishes, that comes from everyone interviewing prospective team members, that comes from everyone analyzing finances — that all continues.

And yes, the pizzas keep flying. They keep flying from the hands of longtime, dough-tossing maestro Matt Smith.

“Love,” he says of the secret. “All love.”

It’s actually something much more specific. It’s in the binders that keep precise measurements down to the .02 ounce of ingredients that go into the dough. There are also detailed instructions on water temperature and time for proofing. Taste inspections are frequent, as are subtle tweaks, depending on the local climate that shifts with the seasons.

“The dough is a science. It’s an art form,” says Nancy Wainwright, general manager. “Jen and Anne got it nailed down, and we don’t want to mess it up.”

Wainwright, 57, has helped maintain other aspects of the restaurant that she’s come to love. “I’ve had a lot of jobs,” she says, “and this is one of the best jobs I’ve ever had.”

She went back to school a while ago. She planned to enter the medical field.

“I graduated, and I stayed here,” she says. “Because this is way more fun.”

On the menu

Build-your-own pizzas starting at $12.49 for 14-inch, $17.99 for 18-inch. Also pizzas by the slice and stromboli by the square ($2.50-$4.75). Pizzas made with house dough, red or white sauce and mozzarella cheese out of Wisconsin.

At last check, 10 specialty pies ($18-$26), with the four-meat Meaty Boy being most popular. A staff favorite is the Bob Steve, named for a local who helped build the restaurant. It’s a Mediterranean take with an olive oil base, mozzarella, spinach, kalamata olives, artichoke hearts, feta, tomatoes and garlic. Another favorite is the Mean Green, combining chicken, basil pesto, spinach, onions, mushrooms and garlic. We enjoyed the Little Italy, with Italian sausage, basil, garlic and ricotta.

Also rotating specialties. Most beloved: the pizza featuring peaches when the fruit is harvested in nearby Palisade come late summer.

Founder Jen Zeuner took special pride in creating the stromboli (full order, $25, serves three to six). It’s a roll stuffed with Canadian bacon, pepperoni, salami and provolone cheese. Also calzones and specialty sausage rolls (six for $22) — spicy links, sweet peppers, ricotta, provolone and marinara wrapped in dough.

Choice of five salads at last check (“littles” and “bigs” $8-$12). Fruita Power Company is a Southwest nod: quinoa, black beans, corn, onion, bell peppers, cherry tomatoes and feta. Chicken, walnut, cherry, gorgonzola and pear with the Sedona. Beet Street is a medley of goat cheese, beets, dried cherries and walnuts.