Leo’s Marvelous Bites brings taste of Puerto Rico to Sauk Valley

STERLING - Celia Fernandez is playing the heroic role of Captain Marvel well, and her late brother, Leoner “Leo” Melendez, would be proud of her.

Growing up in Chicago, she would never hear the end of Leo’s love for Marvel Comics superheroes — and if he ever needed a helping hand from his sibling, Fernandez was happy to oblige.

Today, she’s helping keeping Leo’s memory and his passion for his heroic idols alive with a passion of her own: cooking the very treats they enjoyed growing up and bringing them to the Twin Cities.

Fernandez owns Leo’s Marvelous Bites, along with her brother, David Solis. It serves Puerto Rican dishes and meals from the Kitchen Incubator of Northwest Illinois, across from Gartner Park in Sterling. Empanadas — which have meat, cheese and vegetables inside a crescent-like shell — along with potato balls and steak sandwiches are among the staples of many Puerto Rican restaurants and homes, and they now can be found locally.

After setting up at special events and advertising occasional carryout specials from the kitchen, Fernandez has found that many locals really enjoy a taste of Puerto Rico.

“It’s become big and it’s taken off,” Fernandez said. “I didn’t think Puerto Rican food would ever be a hit in these areas. It’s amazing how people are really loving it. It’s really, really nice.”

Fernandez has lived in Dixon for about 15 years, and her family would come over on occasion from the Chicago area to celebrate the holidays with her and her family. Cooking was, and still is, a big part of those get-togethers, and Leo would always make sure his sister made some food he could take back home to Hammond, Indiana, with him. Thanksgiving of 2020 was the last time Leo was part of a family gathering: He later contracted COVID-19 and died on Dec. 28, 2020, at his home.

Melendez knew his sister had a talent for food, and had hoped she would someday turn that talent into a business.

“My brother Leo was a big, giant guy, full of laughs and really funny,” Fernandez said. “He was like my dad, really. We spent a lot of time together. We would make these potato balls together, and the empanada, and he would always say, ‘I don’t know why you won’t open up your own place.’ He was a great man, and a hard, hard worker, too.”

Fernandez honored his brother’s wish by starting Leo’s Marvelous Bites in October 2021 out of the Kitchen Incubator, a joint project of the Greater Sterling Development Corp., Sauk Valley Area Chamber of Commerce, and the City of Sterling — with help from private donations — designed to help budding food-based businesses a place to get off the ground. Further honoring her brother, the names of her empanadas are named after Marvel and DC superheroes.

The Iron Man empanada is a pollo guisado with Puerto Rican chicken stew with green pepper, chicken, potatoes, carrots and olives. The Aquaman empanada has shrimp. The Hulk, true to its character, has some greens in it such as broccoli slaw and green peppers, as well as mushrooms and onions. The Thor is a steak taco empanada with cilantro, onion and chihuahua cheese; the Spider-Man has pepperoni, mozzarella and marinara; and the Batman has Philadelphia cheesesteak with green peppers, mushrooms, onions and cheddar cheese.

Many customers have told Fernandez that her food lives up to the business’s name, and that’s when she gets to tell them the marvelous meaning behind the name.

“We named it that because he was a Marvel freak,” Fernandez said. “We were trying to incorporate Marvel with marvelous. That’s all he loved. Before he passed away, that’s kind of what our game plan was. He was like, ‘Why don’t you open up your own place?’ So it has a lot of meaning to it.”

The potato balls and steak sandwiches are also popular sellers. The steak sandwiches come with thin strips of marinated steak between plantain bread. The potato balls — which were Leo’s favorite, his sister said — are made with meat stuffed inside mashed potatoes rolled into a ball, breaded and deep fried. They’re usually made with ground beef, but sometimes Fernandez substitutes another meat or includes cheese in the mix.

Fernandez is always willing to try new recipes, and said she’s fortunate to have family members help her out with the business, which is especially helpful when she’s playing the roles of mom and grandma when she isn’t in the kitchen. Her mother, Aurora Lopez, helps out with the cooking from time to time.

For her occasional carryout specials, she will announce those dates in advance on the Leo’s Marvelous Bites Facebook page, with a deadline for orders and a date for customers to come to the Kitchen Incubator to pick them up “hot and fresh,” just how she likes it. Catering services also are available.

Special community events have been the largest means of exposure: Leo’s was a regular vendor at the Dixon City Market this summer, and also participated in the Taste of Fiesta in Rock Falls on Sept. 10, Walnut Fest on Sept. 17, the Woodhaven Fall Fest near Sublette on Oct. 8 and 9, and plans to set up at Dixon’s Scarecrow Fest on Oct. 22. When it was at the market in Dixon, many of her regulars who would come from Sterling and Rock Falls to try different things on the menu, Fernandez said.

Fernandez is glad to find that the area has been very welcoming to try out new dishes to eat.

“It’s a lot of work, but it’s gratifying when you get all of the feedback,” Fernandez said.

Seeing others enjoy his sister’s cooking as much as he did would no doubt make Leo happy, and if he were here today, he would likely look at his sister’s success and proclaim — in a word used often by Marvel Comics’ Stan Lee, who celebrated its message of moving onward and upward — “Excelsior!”

More info

Leo’s Marvelous Bites opens for carryout orders from the Kitchen Incubator of Northwest Illinois, 1701 Industrial Drive in Sterling, on occasion. Cartering services are also available. Call 815-486-5577, or find it on Facebook for carryout dates and times, or for more information.

The Kitchen Incubator

The Kitchen Incubator of N.W. Illinois is a 3,000 square foot, commercially licensed, commercially equipped kitchen that can be rented by the hour by individuals with a dream of starting a food-based business. The Kitchen Incubator of NW Illinois is also available for food-based fund raisers, teachers, cooking classes, and most other situations where a licensed food production facility is needed. Call 815-626-2665 or go to kitchenincofnwil.org for more information.