You want to talk to the person cooking without shouting through a doorway. Taking out the whole wall sounds like the obvious fix, until the sideboard, light switch, and kitchen storage all need somewhere else to go. A wider opening may give you the connection you're missing. The useful test is how much wall needs to move to make an ordinary evening easier.
Name the problem before removing the wall
Write down the moment that feels awkward now. Is someone cooking cut off from conversation? Is the dining room hard to reach? Is the garden hidden? Draw the smallest opening that improves that specific moment, then compare it with the full removal.
A cased opening can connect rooms while leaving a wall return for furniture or kitchen storage. In a bungalow we planned, the owners wanted to talk across the kitchen and dining room. Full removal also took away the only good place for their sideboard. We drew the retained ends around the furniture, then had the structural design checked for that opening. They got the conversation and kept somewhere to put the serving dishes.
Draw the furniture and listen
Place the furniture you actually intend to keep, including pieces against the wall that might disappear. Then consider a television, a dishwasher, a person on a call, and someone cooking. In that bungalow, the opening improved the view but did nothing useful to stop dishwasher noise. A cased opening leaves some room definition; it is not acoustic isolation. If quiet is the real problem, widening a hole in the wall deserves another think.
Let the structure set the feasible choices
Toronto lists wall alterations among projects requiring building permit review. Have the load path, supports, services, and project approvals assessed before choosing an opening size. A modest-looking widening is not automatically minor work.
Choose full openness when the furniture, kitchen, and daily routes work better together. Keep a cased opening when its wall ends still have useful jobs. Bring both versions to the structural review, with the furniture drawn in. That gives the designer a clear household problem to solve instead of a request for the biggest possible hole.