Today's picky topic

A friend of mine posted a link today, stating her point of "I believe the cure to picky eating is kids in the kitchen."
I believe that when someone says they have a "cure" to any particular
childhood behavior, they haven't been exposed to enough children yet.  I too, have fallen victim to these attitudes in my past, and having another baby or two usually cured it. 

Using the example before us, I have six kids, all of whom have "helped" in the kitchen from the time they could stand on a chair, if not sooner.   They also grocery shop with us.   Every one of them usually is game about trying new foods, especially whatever we pick out at the farmer's market.  Each and every one of these six kids has totally different ideas about how said food should be prepared.
Granted, food intolerances/allergies, etc. have played a role in shaping some of them.  The one who is a sauce hater and likes all food plain is probably that way due to being extremely intolerant to gluten and dairy, and sauces being one the worst culprits for his "accidental exposures."  Ditto on the kid who eyes every granola bar w/ suspicion and is allergic to nuts.
Even my human garbage disposals (aka, boys 1 & 3) have some definite preferences about food.  They are also the ones who cook for themselves the most.    Reconciling E2s sauce addiction to E1s sauce hatred is one of my top kitchen challenges.
Our little first grade princess has always had standards for dairy products.  She doesn't like to drink milk that doesn't come from a glass bottle, prefers certain types of cheese over others, and adores yogurt.
Miss P likes to "doctor" whatever is put before her, even if she helped make it.
Si guy will try any new food before 3pm...but hates to eat dinner, even if he likes it.  It's just too close to bedtime as far as he's concerned.
All of our kids preferences come from their exposure to food in the kitchen, not the lack of it.

And that's okay.  Their dad doesn't like most fish.  I don't like many, many, cooked vegetables.  (Raw is another matter.)  I empathize w/ my anti-sauce kid, because I don't care for tomatoes either.  Everyone is entitled to their likes/dislikes within reason.  The trick is to learn to accept what you dislike with grace when it's presented with love.  Food is for our nourishment, not our whims.  Everyone has to accept situations they don't like sometimes.  Everyone has to eat food they don't like sometimes, just to be polite.  It's a grown up skill.  At least that's what I tell my kids if they start to complain.
This means daddy eats fish.  It also means E2 eats spaghetti and Miss D has to deal w/ non-glass milk until we can afford to increase our food budget by about $20 a week.  It means E2 eats roast beast and our oldest eats baked beans.  And for the most part, they've adapted.  Sure they're still kids and we sometimes find broccoli or beans under the dining room table rug.  Sometimes we catch them trading what they don't like for what they do off each other's plates. 
In general though, what we're doing seems to be working.   Other than our oldest two, who push the top and bottom of the weight chart, our kids are in the normal range.  All six are active.  They eat a green food every day and take a fresh fruit or veggie in their lunch without me having to inspect daily.  They have favorites like broccoli and jicama.   It works.