Feeling Saucy

By Lisa Arnett
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Shop for gourmet gifts or stock your own pantry at these sauce-centric stores 

Gindo’s Spice of Life
2002 W. Main St., St. Charles 
114 E. Wilson St., Batavia 

Chris Ginder has been making sauces since childhood. “I remember seeing a chef grilling red pepper on the stove, and I was fascinated,” he says. “I would eat something at a restaurant, go home, and try to recreate that dish. I made my first habanero hot sauce at 10 years old.” While living in Los Angeles with his wife, Mary, Ginder started growing his own jalapeños and poblanos and developed the recipe that is now Gindo’s top-selling Jalapeño-Poblano Mild Verde Hot Sauce. “I thought, how come nobody makes hot sauces with these kinds of farm-fresh ingredients?” he says. After moving back to the Chicago area in 2015, the Ginders rented a commercial kitchen space in Naperville and sold their sauces at the Batavia Farmers’ Market and Geneva French Market as well as online. “The secret ingredient in our sauce isn’t necessarily our recipe; it’s the quality of the ingredients we are using,” he says. “And where better than here in the Midwest to source all of these quality ingredients? We weren’t going to use mashes or purées or dehydrated ingredients when we could source whole peppers from local farms.”

The couple (right) actually hadn’t intended to operate their own store. However, when searching for their own manufacturing facility, they found a building in St. Charles with space for retail. The Ginders also are operating a seasonal storefront at the Batavia Boardwalk Shops through Dec. 20. “If you walk into either of our stores, you’ll see wall of sauce—a variety of wonderful flavors ranging in heat level from mild to extra spicy, from sweet to savory,” Mary says. In addition to their core six flavors, they’re always working on limited-release sauces and small-batch collabs with local businesses, such as Cotton Candy Foxy Sour Hot Sauce created for Fox Republic Brewing Company in Yorkville and Keller’s Kickin’ Corn Hot Sauce made with sweet corn from Keller’s Farmstand in Oswego. 

Good to know: Gindo’s Garlic Goddess Hot Sauce, a collab with Elburn’s Garlic Breath Farm, will be featured in the Illinois Department of Agriculture’s 2026 Holiday Box, which includes products that are processed, produced, or packaged in Illinois, available at illinoisproductholidaybox.com.

Galena Garlic Company
318 W. State St., Geneva

Before father-daughter team Laszlo Marton and Nina Stahl became store owners, they were garlic farmers—and still are. “We started strictly as a garlic farm in Galena in 2003, but people were always asking us, ‘Where is your store?’ ” Stahl says. They opened a small retail area in historic Galena’s DeSoto House Hotel, selling their fresh garlic as well as few spice blends and salsas. In 2007, they moved into their own space on Main Street in Galena and added a storefront in Geneva in 2010. They now have an outpost in Madison, Wisconsin, plus two in Tennessee, where Stahl now resides. 

Their Galena-grown garlic plays a starring role in their house line of barbecue sauces, hot sauces, ketchups, dressings, and marinades. Their creamy garlic and roasted garlic dressings are especially popular for crudite, wings, and salads. “We also sell a lot of our Awesome Sauce, which is a great dipping sauce for chicken fingers, fries, any kind of appetizer-y thing,” Stahl says. 

Good to know: Need a gift for the gourmand in your life? Check out Galena Garlic Company’s pantry packs, which feature a variety of spice mixes and flavored olive oils. 

Photos: April Duda Photography (Gindo’s); Galena Garlic Company