Living in Minneapolis and watching our scene progress as it has, it’s easy to forget that progress marches forward in other places, too. A recent vacation to Wisconsin revealed some fascinating culinary journeys – a state treasure that has been developed into something of a House on the Rock style curiosity, a new Asian-inspired spot that is crushing the brief with flavor and balance, and a stuck-in-time-diner that, as far as I’m concerned, has earned the right to remain stuck in time for as long as it would like.
STOP ONE: ISHNALA | LAKE DELTON
This fuckin’ place. Pardon my language, but that’s truly the most fitting way to commence this particular essay. You can’t throw a maraschino cherry in Wisconsin without hitting a magazine, newspaper, or talking head testimonial about this venerable Dells-area supper club, and so its gravity drew us in. Upon arriving, we found ourselves propelled up a seemingly endless wooded driveway studded by a series of tree-mounted self-promotional signs containing excerpted praise from the national press.
Ishnala has become *The* Supper Club, and as someone who has been to many many dozens of supper clubs, and grew up eating at a supper club, and has many opinions about supper clubs, let me say this: Ishnala is not actually a supper club. It is an amusement park where the theme is “supper club,” right down to the tacky gift shop selling branded steak knives and bottles of Old Fashioned syrup.
This isn’t a hit piece, per se – there’s actually much to like about the place, starting with its incredible surroundings, a steep hill overlooking Mirror Lake. You can sit at a rustic table by the lake drinking a pre-dinner Brandy Old Fashioned ($8.50) and eating pre-dinner Shrimp Cocktail ($12) listening to a mid-grade guitarist plink away at old standards while you monitor the buzzer in your pocket that will let you know when you’re allowed to head inside for the main event.
Here’s “The Deal With Ishnala”: They don’t take reservations, so your best bet is turning up at 3:30 or 4pm before the crowds descend like locusts, even on a random summer Tuesday. Don’t be surprised (as we were) when you’re given a buzzer and exiled to one of the restaurant’s three (possibly four?) bars before dinner, even if most of the tables are empty. If you want to eat dinner, you need to do your time drinking cocktails and scarfing scrimps and cheese curds. Them’s the breaks.
Dinner itself is a pretty inflexible affair. You’re pretty much guaranteed to spend $50-80 a plate for a steak preceded by a small, dull, but edible salad, and accompanied by a potato (recommended), fries (eh), or what may be the world’s laziest attempt at “vegetables” (barely cooked and apparently unseasoned broccoli and partially peeled carrots, very much not recommended.)
The steak is good. The view of the lake (most tables have one) is highly enjoyable. The Old Fashioneds are very Wisconsin (light, fizzy, quite sweet if you order “sour,”” VERY sweet if you get the “sweet”) and go down as easily as you might hope. Dessert (we tried the chocolate mousse) is old fashioned and decent. Service is cheerful and on point. The bill is absolutely enormous; our group of 7 (3 kids, 4 adults) clocked in at nearly $600 when the night was over.
In short, the place is A Wisconsin Experience, and is absolutely a terrific place to bring the family for dinner at 4pm on a Tuesday when Uncle Dave, who sold his 50-person accounting firm in suburban Milwaukee for a mint pre-pandemic, is picking up the tab. If you’re on your own dime and your own time, your mileage may vary. You’ll get a story out of it no matter what, though, and there’s something to be said for that.
Ishnala, S2011 Ishnala Rd, Lake Delton, Wisc, 608.253.1771, MON-FRI | Bar 3:30 PM | Dining 4:00 PM, SAT-SUN Bar 2:30 PM | Dining 3:10 PM
STOP TWO: JEN’S ALPINE CAFE AND SOUP KITCHEN | BARABOO
Despite the overall feeling of national decay that defines 21st Century America, it’s still pretty easy to travel to any random small town and find a classic diner. It’s fairly difficult, however, to find a classic diner that still does food properly: scratch made, with perceptible love and care.
The meal we received at Jen’s Alpine Cafe and Soup Kitchen in Baraboo was really nothing fancy. A competent-to-the-point of tasty Cheeseburger ($11) that came with a alarmingly thick but really quite tasty Beer-Cheese Soup. Three thick, tasty, cinnamon-spiked pieces of French Toast ($8). Poached Eggs and Toast ($5) were workmanlike but properly cooked and satisfying. Hot Cocoa ($3.25) won rave reviews from the kids at the table, and then came dessert.
We tried three pies and a cake: Triple Cherry, Peach Raspberry, and Dutch Apple pies; plus a Lemon Raspberry Torte. All of them were good, with the cake and peach raspberry pie being particularly good. What does “good” mean in this context? Sharp, clear, fresh-tasting fruit flavors, sweetness without syrupy overkill, crust that held together without being claggy or unpleasant. In short: a classic country dessert course.
Jen’s Alpine Cafe and Soup Kitchen, 117 4th Street, Baraboo, Wisc., 608.356.4040, THU-MON 7am-3pm, TUE-WED CLOSED
STOP THREE: AHAN | MADISON
At the recommendation of friend-of-the-magazine and Madison food critic extraordinaire Lindsay Christians, we spent our one free lunch in Madison at the southeastern Asian restaurant Ahan. Ladies and gentlemen: These guys are some of the best in the business, which must be contextualized by saying that this statement acknowledges and understands the overall excellence of Hai Hai, Mi-Sant, Diane’s Place, Quang, and so forth. Ahan is right up there.
Take the Tom Kha ($19), for example. It’s difficult to make this galangal, lemongrass, and coconut milk soup badly – even a phoned-in version tends to be palatable. But it’s similarly difficult to do one that really stands out. Ahan’s version was somehow richer than any we’ve tried before with a beautiful, blindingly sharp lime-driven citrus attack. It stands heads and shoulders above the crowd. Even if the rest of our meal had been garbage, we’d probably find our way back for the Tom Kha. And the rest of the meal was very much not garbage.
For example: the Chicken Sandwich Special ($15), which featured fried lemongrass chicken, chevre, pickled shallots, and a thick, sweet, smokey tomato and bacon jam. The chicken was substantial but not difficult to hook one’s jaws around, crunchy without being tooth-shatteringly hard, tender, suffused with lemongrass flavor but not overwhelmingly so. The jam’s impact was to soften and sweeten the overall dish, which was carried ably by the tender but structurally sound bun.
The restaurant’s Drunken Noodles ($19) was like no other version of this dish I’ve had, to its credit – incredibly tender and luscious noodles, a really pronounced kick of fresh, ripe tomatoes in the sauce, plus heat that was welcome but not aggressive. In short: Hell yeah.
What else? We tried the Chevre and Cream Cheese Wontons ($12) – crispy, chewy, accompanied by a bright pineapple sweet and sour sauce. Delicious. The restaurant’s Thai Iced Tea ($5) was full flavored and refreshing, not syrupy or sweet, and ranks among the best we’ve tried. The non-alcoholic Tropical Mule (ginger beer topped up with papaya, lime, and lime leaf; $7) was a bright, gorgeous, pleasantly fizzy refresher.
Other details: Warm, classy, welcoming dining room, a greenhouse style outdoor patio, competent-to-the-point-of-truly hospitable service. Next time we return to Madison, we’ll return to Ahan.
Ahan, 744 Williamson Street, Madison, Wisc., 608.867.4001, TUE 4-9pm, WED-SAT 12-3pm 4-10pm, SUN 12-3pm 4-8pm, MON CLOSED