When a late-night fire threatened to end the business at Smokey’s Restaurant and Tavern, the tight-knit restaurant family found a way to persevere. The restaurant has been reinvented as a “to go” business, operating out of the back of neighboring Jake’s Ice Cream Parlor at 5992 N. Hubbard Lake Road in Spruce.

Manager Cindy Laur said the fire appears to have started in the smoke room as the tavern was getting ready to close around 11 p.m. May 4. The fire spread throughout the attic and fully engulfed the business about a half-hour after it began.

Despite the efforts of firefighters responding from four different departments, Laur said they just couldn’t get ahead of the fire.

“It just felt like my heart and soul was being ripped right out,” Laur said, upon realizing the restaurant she managed for the past four years would be lost.

Laur said everyone on staff and in the community was initially numb and devastated at the loss but that their focus quickly turned to finding jobs for the employees whose livelihoods were disrupted by the fire. Then they began to think about how Smokey’s carried a lot of business through the summer and its customers were going to have to find somewhere else to go.

Fortunately Smokey’s was blessed to have acquired Jake’s Ice Cream Parlor three years ago and lucky to have an owner who cared about his employees enough to find a way to keep the business going, Laur said. It was Owner Brian Sanders who had the idea of expanding the ice cream parlor to include “to go” food, she said.

“(The thought was) if we can at least do pizzas and subs to go — it would give somebody another option and keep us going, keep our name out there, keep our good food,” she said.

In a little over a week, staff and members of the community who volunteered for the task, transformed the back of Jake’s Ice Cream Parlor into a kitchen. Laur said they had to knock out a couple of walls and add some things to rearrange and everyone worked right up until the business opened on Memorial Day weekend.

“The response was just overwhelming,” she said of the support the business received when it opened. “People were just very happy that they could get another Smokey’s pizza and that we were still here.”

Smokey’s To Go offers a smaller selection of Smokey’s original menu, including customer favorites such as their pizzas, subs, sandwiches and salads. Laur said they have had to be a little more creative at the new location and have added pasta and potato salads to the menu. And when customers said they missed the restaurant’s crab rangoon, they found a way to turn the customer favorite into a pizza.

Laur said Smokey’s will continue with its dockside delivery, where the “to go” orders are delivered to boats at Hubbard Lake’s east dock, and Jake’s Ice Cream Parlor will continue to serve ice cream.

Since opening as Smokey’s To Go, cook Loren John said every person who comes in is excited to hear there is something available to them instead of just ice cream. He said the community has been nothing but supportive of the business and its staff and he hopes they will continue to support the business into the summer.

“We’re grateful that there is a community like there is here that will support us and not just look away and go someplace else,” he said.

While the business continues as Smokey’s To Go this summer, Laur said Sanders intends to rebuild Smokey’s Restaurant and Tavern at its original location at 5982 N. Hubbard Lake Road. The existing structure is slated for demolition but a timeline for construction has yet to be determined.

Smokey’s To Go is located at 5992 N. Hubbard Lake Rd in Spruce and open for business daily 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. To go orders can be placed by calling 727-2112.