About Us
Staff Information
Contact a Catering Consultant at
630-238-8261
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The Sweet Baby Ray’s Story
My brother Larry and I started thinking seriously about Barbecue in 1982 when we first entered
into Chicago’s Mike Royko’s Riboff. In 1985 we won second prize out of 700 contestants.
Over the years, slowly at first and with the help of friends and family, our hobby was turning into
a business. Incorporating in 1986, the business was more like a hobby until my high school friend
at Lane Tech, Mike O’Brien came on board in 1989 and helped shape and grow the business into
the national brand Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue Sauce ultimately became.
In June of 2005, the first Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue Restaurant in Wood Dale, Illinois opened.
A friendly, 36-seat counter service barbecue joint designed to give us the opportunity to develop
a strong staff and learn about the restaurant business. With the help of Executive Chef Paul
Papadopoulos, we introduced an authentic urban barbecue menu with a southern flair and a
Cajun influence...
Click here to read the whole story! 
Core Values
Integrity
Honesty
Professionalism
Family
Friendship
Happiness
Passion
We care mightily about
what we do and how we
do it. We have a genuine
love for our business and
a desire to make people
happy. We enjoy creating
lasting memories.
Commitment
To our ourselves
To our team
To our guests
To our community
Quality
We use the best available
and most appropriate
products for each purpose.
Hospitality
Our goal is to elevate your
guests experience through
warm, friendly, and
comfortable hospitality.
We work with our family
and our friends, so
employees embrace
our culture. We are for
you and your guests.
Service
Our high caliber staff
works as a team to
anticipate guest’s needs.
We continuously train our
staff which is ultimately
reflected in superior
guest service.
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With the successful introduction of our Wood Dale location we were encouraged to open a
larger facility. On December 18th 2007, Mike O’Brien and I opened Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue
Elk Grove. Our Elk Grove property is a beautiful, 225 seat full service restaurant, including a full
bar, a private dining area, an outdoor patio and a separate carry out sales area. Sweet Baby Ray’s
Elk Grove is a very comfortable place where families and friends come to enjoy special times and
great food. We are all excited about our team and our commitment to Elk Grove Village and the
surrounding communities.
In 2008, Sweet Baby Ray’s Wood Dale acquired True Cuisine, DuPage County’s top caterer.
Jean True, founder, continues on with Sweet Baby Ray’s leading this division. We also obtained
our Chicago Caterer’s license and established an office in Chicago in the very popular West Loop
neighborhood. Our goal is to continue to offer two great brands and build our catering business
in DuPage and Cook Counties. Both brands have strong followings in both corporate and social
events and True Cuisine has particular expertise in elegant off-premise weddings. During the
summer of 2008, our team won first place in ribs at the famous Naperville Ribfest (the second
largest festival of it’s kind), and took second place in sauce, in only our second year of competing—
a feat almost never before accomplished. In spite of the difficult economic climate during 2008,
Sweet Baby Ray’s was blessed and experienced a strong year in sales growth.
Now in 2009, Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue Restaurant and Catering Company in Wood Dale
currently has several exciting new projects. We continue to invest in growth and the development
of our intellectual capital. We have hired and are training new sales staff to meet the increased
demand for our catering products. We have recently introduced our new restaurant menu including
a regional barbecue menu offering different authentic daily selections from the great barbecue
areas around the US including East Carolina, Memphis, Kansas City, Texas and of course Chicago,
as well as an International barbecue day all designed to help educate the public on different styles
of barbecue around the country and around the world. We are also once again updating our
vastly expanded catering menu, featuring far more than the barbecue that we are known for,
demonstrating the breadth and skill of our professional culinary staff.
Unique for an independent business like Sweet Baby Ray’s, as part of our serious commitment to
excellence and truly great food, our highly trained culinary team includes seven professionally
trained chefs. Our courteous and professional staff work hard to exceed your expectations and
we think your guests will enjoy some of the best tasting food anywhere.
Dave Raymond
“Sweet Baby Ray”
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Our Restaurants
Sweet Baby Ray's Barbecue Elk Grove is proud to offer some of the finest barbecue anywhere. Our restaurant features all of the smoky favorites from the original Sweet Baby Ray's as well as an expanded menu including steaks, chops, seafood and pastas.
The location seats over 170 people with full service and bar. A private dining room with capacity for 35 guests is available and when weather permits an outdoor patio can accommodate another 60 patrons. Carryout is available with a separate carryout entrance located on the east side of our building.
Our kitchen, supervised by Chef Paul Papadopoulos is open for lunch and dinner and all menu items are prepared to order. We have worked hard to develop a unique menu, a great concept and outstanding food and service. Through thoughtful planning and care, our goal is to offer high quality food at fair prices with the hope and expectation that you will tell your friends and come back soon.
Dave Raymond, aka Sweet Baby Ray, namesake of the second best selling barbecue sauce in the nation, opened Sweet Baby Ray's Wood Dale Barbecue Restaurant in June of 2005. Raymond negotiated the opportunity to open four restaurants with the Sweet Baby Ray's banner when they sold the sauce business a few years ago. Wood Dale was a natural, since it is only a half-mile from his home.
The 36-seat space reveals Raymond's attention to every aspect of the business, from the décor to the menu. Booths are hand-carved out of solid blocks of wood. The cherry red floor comes from a plantation in Louisiana. Food trays are galvanized tin, to imitate the décor of Chicago-style barbecue restaurants from the '50s and '60s. A bookcase full of barbecue books, barbecue posters, and even a chronological historical series of Sweet Baby Ray's Sauce bottles adorn the walls. Other accents depict Chicago landmarks. A display of sports memorabilia includes the last Cubs banner to hang in Candlestick Park traded by the field crew for five pork sandwiches. There is also a unique collection of Sweet Baby Ray's personal memorabilia from the "West Side, Best Side" where he was raised.
The counter service restaurant features an authentic urban barbecue menu with a southern flair and Cajun influence. Menu items include the expected: such as hand-pulled pork sandwiches, smoked beef brisket, baby back and St. Louis Ribs and smoked chicken all slathered with Chicago's favorite Sweet Baby Ray's Barbecue Sauce, and of course Sweet Baby Ray's baked beans. Guests will also find the unexpected: barbecued Cubano sandwich; corn maque choux (whole kernel cream corn simmered in heavy cream with ham), onion, garlic and Cajun spices; Jamaican jerk chicken; hand formed crab cakes; grilled wild shrimp with peppers and onions; and excellent shrimp po' boy sandwiches. And then there's the completely unexpected: green chile mac n' cheese or guests might try "The Duce," a grilled all beef bologna sandwich topped with pulled pork, coleslaw and a money-back guarantee. One might also not expect to find great desserts at a BBQ joint like this, but don't miss the banana pudding or the chocolate mud pie - they are definite pleasers.
Dave Raymond has a passion for excellence and authenticity. "Our business is committed to serving only the very best quality products, providing great service, and warm friendly hospitality - the kind that you would offer to someone in your own home. Our core values are to always do the do the right things for the right reasons." To that end, Sweet Baby Ray's has a very highly talented staff of employees from top to bottom that differentiates them from other typical restaurant businesses you might be familiar with. "How many barbecue restaurants do you know that have a whole staff of professionally trained chefs?" asks Dave Raymond.
Raymond feels that he has the winning formula; since the opening, the operation has received regular accolades as one of the top barbeque joints in Chicagoland fueling rapid growth and creating a demand for expansion into Catering, requiring an increase in the size of the original restaurant.
Having recently purchased the property adjacent to the original Sweet Baby Ray's Barbecue Restaurant at 249 E. Irving Park Road, locals can look for big changes in the near future as the existing restaurant will expand and nearly double it's seating capacity. Sweet Baby Ray's Wood Dale also has big plans to significantly grow their catering business. As part of the new construction, they will be adding nearly 3,000 square feet of new industrial catering kitchen space for the new Sweet Baby Ray's Catering Company division of Sweet Baby Ray's Barbecue. "You will soon be seeing a lot of exciting new construction at our location. The catering sales offices have just been completed, the sign is up, we just moved in, our menu is ready and we are open for business," says Dave Raymond.
Chef Bios
- Paul Papadopoulos
Chef Paul has spent many years as an Executive Chef, including seven years at Heaven on Seven. Educated at Butler University in Indianapolis and Culinary Arts at Kendall College in Chicago, he has also worked and trained New Orleans.
- Mike Nykaza
13 years managing the "back of the house" at corporate hotel giant Marriot kept Mike traveling the country and away from the Midwest, but Sweet Baby brought this Washburn grad back to sweet home Chicago
- Elton Cummings
Elton was born in Belize and lived there until the age of 14 when he and his family moved to Chicago. He has attended Kendall College in Culinary Arts and worked at Chicago's Palmer House Hilton and Heaven on Seven.
- Laurence "Duce" Raymond
Duce is a graduate of Culinary Arts at Kendall College. He is a barbecue veteran from events such as Taste of Chicago and Wrigley Field Rooftops, and he is poised to become one of the next great barbecue men.
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