"I don't like eating olives at school because everyone laughs at me"

[Caligyulea]

This is my DS's explanation for why he hasn't eaten the olives I've put in his lunchbox.

Deeply peeving, as he's such a fussy little sod and olives are one of the few vegetables that he will actually eat like sweets. Until now. He'll eat them at home all the time, but at school, what's obviously happened is incredulity from other kids which has made him self-conscious about eating them.

What a PITA.

The only other thing I can put in his lunchbox that he'll eat is carrot batons.

Anyone got any more ideas of portable veg? He doesn't like sweetcorn.

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cherry tomatoes, celery sticks, cucumber sticks (not that mine would eat thsoe either unless some other child was...)

Mine love them too, but I've always been a bit wary of giving them too many as they seem really really salty to me!

Shame he's being put off by the other children though - maybe some self-esteem building might help!

The I'll eat what I f*ing like you dork heads!

Then again, maybe not

How annoying! Can you put fruit in instead of veg then - maybe that's more acceptable (although I think tbh I'd just carry on with the olives and give him a witty retort to use )

What about adding olives to his sandwiches/rolls eg houmous and olives, or making a pasta or rice salad with them in (you could then add chopped other veg too).
DD loves olives too -its amazing how many kids haven't even tried them (yet still go "eeeurgh")

He won't eat tomatoes or celery. Cucumber is a possibility though.

Yes I'm wondering about the witty retorts. Can't think of any that are suitable for school though.

Also, can't put things in his sandwiches that he actually likes, because he's one of these PITA kids that likes things to be separate and has an immediate "yuk" response to food being mixed up, even if it's food he likes.

I might try it though and see what happens. (Malnutrition, hunger, starvation?)

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I know, but it's a thin line. Unfortunately in his school, fitting in means eating the dreaded turkey bloody twizzlers. Even the carrot batons get sneered at.

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I had this with ds1 too - he wouldn't take tortilla wraps, or even pitta bread pockets, or houmous, or pasta salad, or rice salad..."because no-one else has them and they make fun of me."

I said he should make fun of their Dairyleabloodylunchables and plastic white bread jam butties but he's just not that sort of child

He has school dinners now...

Can I just sympathise on this for a minute? My ds sits with his best friend, whose lunch comprises crisps, chocolate and Capri-sun every day. Mine is no saintly eater but there are certain v healthy things he loves, but won't have because the friend has teased him about them. Honestly! It really drives me mad. We've reached a bit of a compromise on it now and today he agreed to some pasta salad that had olives, pines nuts and tuna in it. I've told him to say this food will make him stronger and better at football because it's healthy.
Cheese dippers are OK - we have the Laughing Cow ones and I think they're reasonably healthy.

PS, I wasn't suggesting cheese dippers were vegetable in origin there! Just meant that they were something that escapes the child yuk radar and is reasonably good for them!

Get him to tell his friends that the olives are actually alien eyeballs, captured when daddy shot down a spaceship in the back garden last week.

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I think it depends on the child

dd1 likes the fact that we bond over how crap light blue ribena is (the sugar free kind) and how vile cheese strings are. But she does want SOME normality so she gets a peperami and occasionally an envy inducing treat in her lunch box

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And cheese is out. DS won't eat cheese. Hence no pizzas in our house.

I hate faddy eaters

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He'd spot it. He just doesn't like the flavour of cheese, tiresome boy. I've given him those pasta things in the past (he likes pasta) with cheese inside, and he's immediately made a disgusted face as soon as he realised it wasn't plain.

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we have cheeseless pizzas in our house.

I feel for the boy a bit, I must say. I was the wierd kid at school with the doorsteps of wholemeal bread sandwiches. How I longed for sliced white normality. Nobody had ever heard of carrot batons, including my mother, thankfully.

Does he have to have veg at lunch, if he has plenty in the evening? or is that a MN clanger?

Not sure NN!

At what age must they have 5 a day? I'm sure DS doesn't (though I think DD does)

I had a similar problem with DD after two years of daily peanut butter sandwiches, she started asking for other things (like jam). Eventually I found out that her friends refuse to sit with her when she has pb as it smells.
I felt that I had to accomodate her feelingsand find a compromise, so she has philadelphia and marmite mixed - marmite on its own wasn't acceptable either due to the smell factor, but if I only put ti in the middle she can pretent its plain cheese!

Can you try differnt fruit like kiwi or dried fruit like apricots?