Mike’s Original Stromboli in Spokane, WA

We’re traveling this week, visiting Mindy’s parents and extended family in eastern Washington. Mindy and I were running some Tribunal-related errands in the area of Spokane, Washington on Saturday and happened to drive by the following business.

Now I was driving, and I’m not the most observant sort to begin with, so all I could have told you was that we’d just driven by a burger joint. If I’d really been paying attention, maybe I could have told you it was a classic-looking burger stand with a take-out window and picnic tables. Mindy’s Tribunal-honed senses, though, focused in on the important part of this picture. “Mike’s Original Stromboli,” she pointed out.

Now, a stromboli isn’t necessarily a sandwich. At best, I’d say the classic stromboli is sandwich-adjacent. Other sites describe it as “a type of turnover filled with various Italian cheeses and cold cuts;” “a pizza that is rolled and baked, then sliced;” a “pizza derivative… like a burrito;” or “basically a pizza roll.” Yet something about that incongruous second billing for “Mike’s Original Stromboli” at such a classic-looking burger stand made us turn around and check it out.

Mike’s Original Stromboli is none of the above. Mike’s Original Stromboli is definitely a sandwich. The menu describes it thus: “On French Bread w/ cappocolla ham, Provolone Cheese, Italian Chili Sauce.”

The French bread is a decent hoagie roll and the Italian Chili Sauce is essentially a somewhat spicy red sauce with ground beef, such as you might have with spaghetti on a weeknight at home. The capicola is not sliced too thin, nor laid on too thick, and the provolone is nice and melty.

The stromboli comes as either a Full or a Half sandwich–we ordered the Full to split along with an order of tater tots. The tots were crisp and well-fried, not the best I’ve had but quite good, and were served with tubs of both fry sauce–a sort of mayo/ketchup combo–and, strangely, tartar sauce.

As a child, Mindy lived in a house in Spokane not too far from Dick’s Hamburgers, another classic and more well-known burger stand near the center of Spokane. When we visit Spokane and she’s craving a burger, it is inevitable that Dick’s is where we’ll go. But I have a feeling that on future visits to the area, I might develop a craving for a stromboli and tots.

Mike’s Burger Royal
6115 E Trent Ave
Spokane Valley, WA 99212
(509) 534-3113