Joe and Ginnie Mae Clay
Clay Family Recipes is built on the legacy of two remarkable individuals, Joe and Virginia Clay (or, as they were known, “Clay and Ginnie Mae”). Our Texas barbecue and comfort food heritage along with a strong entrepreneurial spirit was nurtured through three generations of our family, from award-winning restaurants in California’s high desert to premiere catering services. All of this together finally culminated in the website you’re viewing right now. Our story is one of passion, dedication, and the desire to savor and celebrate the food that brings us all together.
The BBQ – Joe Clay
Joseph “Joe” Clay was born in 1923 in Houston, Texas to parents Jessie and Georgie Clay. He was one of three children in a family of Texans who’d been making great BBQ for generations. His mother Georgie smoked meats in a backyard smokehouse and made BBQ sauce in their kitchen; her smoked meats and fresh sweet potato pies were sold off the back porch to neighbors and others as word of the good food spread.
In adulthood, Joe served in the Armed Forces as a culinary specialist during World War II. In 1943, he married Virginia Mae Perryman (“Ginnie”).
The Comfort Food – Virginia Clay
Virginia “Ginnie” Mae Perryman was born in 1924 in Corpus Christi, Texas to parents Alfred and Annie. In her childhood, she was raised by her grandparents, living on their 40-acre farmland. Among other things, they taught Ginnie how to “cook by the feel” – a family saying that has lived on in the Clay family to this day.
In adulthood, Ginnie met and married Joe Clay in 1943, and during his time in the Armed Forces, she worked at a picture film studio touching up negatives. At home, she continued learning and perfecting treasured family recipes that were passed down from her grandparents.
Eventually, after Joe returned from his service, he and Ginnie started a family of their own, having their three children Diane, Michael, and Darrell.
Joe Clay always had an entrepreneurial spirit. Inspired by memories of his childhood and the culinary expertise he had perfected in the Armed Forces, he always wanted to open a restaurant. Working towards that goal after completing his service in the military, he became the “king of side-hustles”, the very first being a neighborhood grocery store that he ran out of his garage in a small segregated town in Texas. Meanwhile, Ginnie Mae pursued a nursing degree, and when the Clay family moved to California’s San Fernando Valley in 1957, she worked in VA hospitals while Joe worked for the city as a garbage man and in water and power maintenance. All the while, Joe continued his side-hustles selling everything from custom embroidered shirts to garden statues at local flea markets.
The Original Clays Restaurant
In July of 1970, Joe and Ginnie’s work and savings eventually allowed them to start their very first restaurant in the small high-desert town of Adelanto, California. The building they purchased was actually an old military quonset hut; it wasn’t until they added its signature red, white, and blue shingled A-frame roof that “The Clay’s” became a local landmark. Known for serving hickory-smoked BBQ, Ginnie’s homemade pies, and home-cooked comfort food based on generations-old recipes, their restaurant was a famous stopover on old Hwy. 395 on the way to Las Vegas and a favorite among the southern California desert community for many years.
In 1977, the Clays relocated to La Jolla, California and opened the “Clay’s Texas Pit BBQ” restaurant - the first BBQ joint in La Jolla’s exclusive beachside community. Their tiny place with booths and one long community table garnered many awards including "Best of San Diego" by The Reader and was often featured in "Best Bets" on local television. Clay's Texas Pit BBQ was voted "Best BBQ" by San Diego Magazine, and noted by the Los Angeles Times in a feature article.
Joe and Ginnie eventually opened a Las Vegas location of Clay’s BBQ, which ran for about 5 years until they retired in 1992. They continued to live in Vegas and enjoyed traveling and spending quality time with their children and grandchildren in the later years of their lives. Joe and Ginnie Mae passed away in 2005 and 2012 respectively.
Between 1980 and 2001, Joe and Ginnie’s sons Darrell and Michael Clay each started and ran their own successful Clay’s BBQ restaurants in Southern California, including in the cities of Encinitas, Poway, San Diego, and the city of Benicia in the San Francisco Bay Area. Darrell then continued offering the Clay’s ribs and smoked meats in the form of a catering business until around 2010, after which the Clay’s BBQ business officially came to a halt.
After the closing of the last Clay’s BBQ restaurant, son Darrell Clay thought about opening a restaurant or even just selling sauces again. He was always encouraged to restart the family business by friends and family – especially his wife Debbie Clay – but ultimately, nothing ever came to fruition.
Debbie Clay passed away in 2021 after a long and hard-fought battle with breast cancer; Darrell went through a very difficult time with the loss of his partner of over 46 years. Months after her passing, his son Adam gave him an idea – that maybe he could use a new project; something that he could focus on to help him through his grief. Darrell reflected on the passing of his own parents, Joe and Ginnie, and the long legacy that they had carved with the Clay’s BBQ business. Not only that, but Debbie’s encouragement to restart the business when she had been alive, and all the hard work they and Darrell’s parents had done for the Clay family as business owners and parents – instilling the entrepreneurial spirit that now the Clay family is known for. What better project to pay tribute to his own parents, bring the Clay family together, and find a way to support a metastatic breast cancer research fund than to bring back that family BBQ business?
Darrell started by dusting off the old Clay family recipes and researching what it would take to get the famous original Clay’s BBQ sauce bottled. From there came the idea of creating our label, and putting the portrait of Joe and Ginnie Mae Clay on the front as the ones who started the long legacy of the Clay’s business. That portrait was professionally drawn by Debbie Clay’s best friend, Kelli. Then, after meeting with many of the Clay family members, explaining his idea and asking if they were on board, Clay Family Recipes was born.
Each of the members of the Clay Family helps with a different aspect of the business, from professional culinary experience to graphic design, copywriting and video production, and everything in between. And with the continued help of all the Clay’s Team Members, we are thrilled to share our family’s legacy with you, from sauces and rubs to recipes and spice blends.
