Lalo's Story

Not long ago, the average person regarded Mexican Food as being limited to tacos, enchiladas and mouth-boiling salsas. Few people were actually aware of the vast array of sauces, spices, and flavors that make the Mexican cuisine so unique. For nearly thirty years, Lalo's Restaurants has taken pride in bringing this refined cuisine to Chicago. Lalo's traces it's roots to a small 24 seat restaurant located in the heart of Chicago's Mexican Community. 

By following a strict policy of only serving top quality, authentic dishes; that small restaurant steadily grew in popularity. Soon, this location became too small to serve the needs of its existing clientele. Lalo's soon expanded to a full-sized restaurant just two blocks away. By establishing the same food systems and serving the same traditional Mexican dishes (all of which were adopted from family recipes) the restaurant was able to gain more customers. In fact, demand was so big in this area that another unit was opened less than a mile away. For the next nine years, Lalo's Restaurant solely operated from these two units.

Knowing that many new customers were venturing from suburbs such as Cicero, Oak Park, Berwyn, and Bolingbrook the time seemed right to open a new restaurant in the suburbs. In 1984, a new Lalo's was opened in Cicero, Illinois. Sure enough, that the new restaurant became an instant success. In fact, not only did this new Cicero location become the busiest restaurant on that section of Cermak road, but the restaurant soon expanded to the building next door, thus doubling the seating capacity. 

Today, there are a total of 12 units both in the city and the suburbs. Although there have been several franchise proposals, the restaurants still remain entirely family owned. Lalo's restaurant is looking for continued growth in the future. Whatever the future holds, Lalo's has pledged to always serve the same original recipes that have made it a Chicagoland tradition.