> Engineers are the chefs in the back...
I can't help but feel that this betrays a misunderstanding of both Product work and restaurant kitchens. As I see it, while in some restaurants everyone may be called "chef", there is only one "Chef" (with a capital C) who is really in charge of the menu. While everyone benefits from being informed and their input should be respected, if everyone in the kitchen were to make independent menu decisions, it would be anarchy. Same with tech projects, there is a strong benefit to having a singular vision of "what" we are about to release - and the inverse, to avoid scope creep.
I have seen cases where a power-hungry incompetent product owner sets up "mushroom management", but I don't see how having everyone constantly making their own independent product decisions would make things better. As another comment here said, product owners should have authority of the what, while offering engineers and designers information and full flexibility on the how.
To bring it back to the author's analogy - "Too many cooks spoil the broth".
EDIT: minor copy-editing