• stool
• butterknife+potato
• bowls with snacks and a taste of anything that is safe to taste any time I'm working with it
• on-the-hip cooking

Little one has to be on the stool when I'm cutting, but I can cook with me between the hot and the tot all day. Left hip little one, right hand roux spoon.

Toddler towers ftw. They can help cut with their plastic (or metal when a little older) knives and get to watch and participate. Kids stop being as annoying if they feel included. Doesn't take long for them to learn that handles are hot and that popping sounds do ranged damage.

ranged damage made me snort!

But I also am a big supporter of toddler towers. They participate but they are also constrained to a spot and without (much) falling risk. I definitely did the “warm the stove a little bit and make them touch it” to explain that it would get much much hotter and better not touch it then. But he developed a healthy curiosity and he is on the verge of becoming actually helpful in the kitchen. For now, he is the spoon-cleaner

Chopped is an American reality cooking competition show where four chefs compete in three rounds to create dishes using mystery ingredients

For anyone else who doesn't know

I love you parents!! 💚

It's not a job if you love them

Even when they can't actively help it is nice when they are engaged in the process and not actively hindering it.

While true, it is a whole lot more stressfull to cook with a toddler running around you when you are handling pots and pans with hot food or boiling water. Also if you have one of those turbo kids with no off switch, every 5-15 sconds while cooking is you catching your kid just before they hurt themselves on something. Sure this is mostly the first couple of years but that's still upwards of 1500-2000 meals to prepare under those conditions.

I bought one of these things and didn't find it to be helpful. They kept trying to climb it instead of helping. I ended up having to juggle catching them and trying to teach them.

Would probably work better with 1 kid. Especially if they don't like to climb.