Ike’s opens 1st Las Vegas restaurant with $100 sandwich

Now open on the Strip at the Fashion Show Mall, Ike’s Love & Sandwiches features a high roller menu complete with a $100 sandwich named for Howard Hughes.

Ike’s owner Ike Shehadeh said the high roller menu — customers can also get their choice of a cheesesteak or an Italian sandwich for $69 each — is unique to the primarily West Coast franchise’s first Las Vegas location.

“Since the first time I visited Las Vegas when I was 21, I’ve always loved the city,” said Shehadeh, 40. “It’s been my dream for a long time to have a business that I owned be there among all the lights.”

Of course, customers can also get cheaper sandwiches at Ike’s, with menu prices starting about $9.

For $100, though, the Howard Hughes sandwich features American wagyu roast beef fresh from Idaho-based Snake River Farms, brisket and prime rib and is topped with a truffle sauce.

“The Howard Hughes probably would feed four adults, but we advertise that it feeds two,” Shehadeh said. “If you had two hungry people, they might finish it. When I have one, I only eat a quarter of the sandwich. It’s a little over two pounds of meat.”

Along with Shehadeh, the ownership group for the Strip store includes former National Football League running back Marshawn Lynch and former boxer Andre Ward, both Bay Area natives.

Lynch will be at the Fashion Show Mall location, which opened earlier this month, for an event on July 26, Shehadeh said.

Another Ike’s location is scheduled to open near the UNLV campus this fall, and others could be on the way, Shehadeh said.

“We’re working to expand into the outer parts of the Vegas area,” he said. “We’d love to do more on the Strip, also.”

Based in San Jose, Calif., Ike’s has nearly 70 locations, including two in Reno. Shehadeh started the chain in the Bay Area in 2007.

“I had gotten kind of tired of working for other people, so I made a list of things I would do for free,” Shehadeh said. “I always liked to cook and sandwiches are my favorite food. I turned that into Ike’s and here we are.”