ELGIN — Lelo’s Sports Bar and Eatery opened its doors for service in October 2023 in downtown Elgin, in the space where notable neighborhood bar Duke’s Saloon & Grill was formerly located.

Lelo’s is owned and operated by Chris and Kylee Orton, who are first-time business owners but not new to the restaurant business. The couple bring to the table many years of experience in the food service and bar industry.

“We have worked in restaurants before and helped other owners get ready to open,” Kylee Orton said. “In fact, when this space was Duke’s Saloon & Grill, we helped both managers, each time it opened, to get set up and ready. So, we already had an in with some of their contacts.”

Chris Orton has 15 years of experience in the restaurant business, and for six of those years he worked at the Space Needle in Seattle as a steak chef. He also worked at the former Duke’s in Elgin as a chef.

“I was known as the Elgin steak guy,” he said.

The family restaurant and sports bar, which the Ortons named after their son, Leland, is now open for business seven days a week on North Eighth Street and offering pizzas, wings, appetizers and an all-you-can-eat salad bar.

“We chose a sports bar theme because LeLand plays a lot of sports like junior high football, field and track, baseball and boxing,” Kylee Orton said. “Chris is also very tied to the community with sports, doing flag football coaching and helping with baseball.”

Chris Orton said he would also like to get involved with Elgin High School’s football and wrestling programs as a helper in the future.

“Besides team sports, I also fought professionally for 15 years as a mixed martial arts fighter,” he said. “Everything we do for the community involves sports, so we might as well operate a pizza and wings sports bar.”

The sports bar is spacious and includes video games and pool tables but no lottery.

Lelo’s menu

The menu includes a selection of different pizzas, such as cheese, spicy-cheese, pepperoni, all-meat, buffalo chicken, chicken-bacon-ranch and barbecue chicken. Spicy marinara can be ordered on any of the pizzas. Pizzas come in small (14 inch), medium (16 inch) and large (18 inch). The large is $18, and customers have the option to build their own pizza as well.

“We will be making the pizzas and cooking them for our customers. We will at some point offer a take-and-bake option,” Kylee Orton said.

Lelo’s wings come with a variety of sauces, including barbecue, teriyaki, red-hot, garlic parmesan, peanut butter, Asian chili and lemon pepper. Along with the full salad bar, the menu features appetizers like pretzels, tater tots, onion rings, mozzarella sticks and Cajun tots.

The Ortons said they are still perfecting their secret wing sauce for a competitive “wing challenge” where the customer is given a certain number of wings they must eat in a certain amount of time. The winning customer gets the wing meal free, receives a T-shirt and wins a special prize. It’s all done in a spirit of fun and competition at the sports bar for those who are up for the challenge.

“Everybody loves competition, and I noticed here in Elgin, people are competitive and a very sports-oriented community,” Chris Orton said.

Lelo’s will also be introducing “Husky Meals” for lunch on Mondays through Thursdays between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. for Elgin High School students who show their student IDs. The Husky Meals are a $5 value, including a piece of pizza, a bread stick and a soda. Kylee Orton said that a percentage of their profits from these meals will go back into Elgin School District’s athletic programs.

“We just want to give back to the community in any way possible because this is a beautiful place to be and a tight-knit community,” Chris Orton said.

Business plan

The Ortons have a vision for their business and how they can support the community of Elgin.

“Five years out, we’d like to be an established business where all the workers can come and watch a sports game,” Kylee Orton said. “We’re also looking at opening other restaurants in town because we have a few empty buildings.”

The couple started with Lelo’s because the building was big and fit their needs well. They also wanted to start with a simple menu yet offer something that other restaurants in town didn’t make.

Much of what they have planned is still proprietary information because they want to enjoy the “wow” reaction from their community when it is finally revealed.

“We’re creating a place that people can come in and have a good time,” Kylee Orton said. “They will know they are coming to a family-oriented establishment with great food and a clean, sanitary and safe environment.”