[tripper_27]

if you'll forgive my prior snark, some people successfully involve the children in the cooking. When this is done, the children seem to prefer the home-cooked because they are part of the cooking and they are part of the feeding/providing to others.

Don't underestimate the human desire to provide value to the tribe, it runs deep in the evolutionary make-up.

[vanderZwan]

Speaking as someone who successfully involves their toddler in the kitchen: regardless of her great joy in being alllowed to participate and contribute (which you are completely right about), my daughter would still much rather prepare spaghetti for dinner than veggies.

Also, in some kind of weird benign parentification[0] twist, she now loves to feed me food, even if (or more like especially if) she doesn't like it.

So having fun with cooking food seems quite decoupled from her desire to eat it.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parentification - and I say it's benign because cooking together is completely optional for her

[theamk]

Pretty sure no amount of participation in cooking can make children start liking food with specific tastes, like eggplants or celery. If they like it - great! I they don't like it, but parents do - well, _that_ kind of home-cooked food will never be liked.

(Unless you process them so much, and add so many spices, that they no longer have any original taste.. but by that point they are at "pre-packaged" level of cooking)