If you haven’t heard, the New York Historical Society has dropped “society” to become New York Historical. A change they think is more welcoming. Go figure!

We bought tickets to their lecture, “American Chefs: From the White House to Julia Child, ” but we didn’t get the lecture.

Instead, we had a delightful evening hearing Julia Child’s “grand-nephew” (Not the heir kind of nephew — one who is the grandson of her husband Paul’s grandfather’s twin brother.)

Paul Prud’homme regaled us with stories about the White House, Presidents and his great aunt’s tales, all from his recent book, “Dinner with the President.”

Afterward, we walked down Columbus past the newly opened Mermaid Inn to Harvest Kitchen, a fairly new, inviting restaurant offering comforting yet creative food with many healthy options. It’s a restaurant that also cares where it’s

We sipped our cocktails (an Old Fashioned, $12 and their Ginger Fresco, $16, a blend of gin, ginger syrup, mint, lemon juice and grapefruit juice) while deciding on the starters.

Our three starters arrived at once, including the warm fava beans with escarole ($15), shaved parmesan, shallots and hot peppers; their grilled asparagus ($18) with baby greens, bacon lardons and hollandaise, all topped with a soft poached egg and the charred unusually delicious cauliflower hummus ($16) with a honey-lime drizzle served with large chunks of cooked zaatar pita chips.

As we dove into our feast, a server placed their curried roast cauliflower with chilies and garam masala on our table, saying it had been ordered by mistake and that they were giving it to us gratis.

I highly recommend visiting Harvest Kitchen; I plan to return next time I’m in the area to sample more of their menu or one of the eight sister places.

Harvest Kitchen
Upper West Side
269 Columbus Ave,
New York, NY 10023
(646) 870-0810
harvestkitchennyc.com