Confluence

Address:
211 N. Broad St., Prescott, Wisconsin, 715-262-5700, dineatconfluence.com

The Scene
An unremarkable storefront on the main drag in rough-and-ready Prescott is not the first place you would expect to find a restaurant as sophisticated as Confluence. There are comfy leather chairs and about a dozen tables, set with contemporary flatware and stemware (the milk-glass water goblets are stunning). Opaque glass screens set a cool and relaxed tone; the room has a contented vibe. Locals and city folk seem thrilled to find a hot spot in the midst of the St. Croix Valley.

Our Take
Mark McGraw, formerly of Vine Park Brewery in St. Paul, went AWOS (absent without stove) for several years before opening his small-town restaurant with a big-city feel. McGraw is on site 24/7 (a rarity these days), so the restaurant is open only for limited hours Wednesday through Sunday. The result is a tightly controlled environment, where the staff is bright-eyed and smiling and the food is, by necessity, rigorously fresh. The menu, which changes weekly, is well planned and devoid of pretension, as is the small but carefully chosen wine list.

First courses run the gamut from homey treats—such as the sautéed mushrooms glazed in a simple pan sauce hiding a deep, fortified wine kick and the crab and artichoke torte served warm with crispy leeks and an avocado salsa—to dishes with a distinctly more grown-up feel, including seared duck breast, the restaurant’s signature seafood cakes, and an entrée of seared scallops served alongside warm cucumber pasta. The yin-yang of Sunday-supper-style fare and food-forward restaurant cookery extends to the rest of the menu as well. Citrus-rubbed roasted chicken stuffed with feta cheese served over Israeli tabbouleh salad, the beef bourguignon with roasted vegetables, and the pork tenderloin with wild rice– corn cakes are accessible enough for the customer who considers Confluence a splurge and intriguing enough for the spoiled restaurant snob. All of McGraw’s food is consistently well cooked, precisely plated, and served with style.

Talk Soup
"Identity is a tough thing here in Prescott. You put everything into a place, and you roll the dice, hoping your customer gets it,” McGraw told me. At Confluence, he has boldly rolled the dice and is betting the customers get it. One of the more unpleasant restaurant trends is the emphasis on needless server explanation of everything from a concept to the way the chef cooks. You know you are in for it when the “have you dined with us before?” mantra is proffered. What follows is rarely of any use, except perhaps to folks who have spent the past decade under anesthesia. These needless asides assume we are all rubes who have never seen the inside of a restaurant. If we’re too reticent to ask, isn’t it our own problem? At Confluence, servers let the experience speak for itself.