One moment you’re filled with anticipation and waiting with your friend for the competition to start, the next, you’re the Northwest High School Lettuce Eating Club Champions. Everyone cheers when they see the vanished head of lettuce and the remnants of the green leaves and you’re immediately swarmed with phones in your face and a sash placed around your neck. You’ve proven yourself in front of all your peers. 

This is what Northwest High School senior, Ian Kim, felt like when he first joined and competed in the NWHS Lettuce Eating Club’s contest. When asked what his experience was like competing in the club, he said, “It was really fun to compete against other students at Northwest High School.” He went on to add that his favorite part was winning the competition with his “mans Chase [Corpuz].”  

Kim plans to compete again at the next club meeting.

It’s a well-known fact that Northwest has a variety of clubs, ranging from Book Club to Super Smash Bros Club, but one club Northwest lacked, before this year, was a Lettuce Eating Club. The Northwest Members of the Lettuce Eating Club dedicate themselves to the consumption of lettuce. Meetings center around competitions where participants compete against each other to see which team of two can eat a head of lettuce in the fastest amount of time. 

The brains behind the whole operation, and the founder of the club, is senior Olivia Yuen. Yuen was inspired to pioneer the creation of the club after seeing many other people doing it on social media and TikTok. Yuen added that she started the club mainly to, “To have a memory; to make a mark on the school.”

Not even Yuen could predict the number of people who would be interested in the bizarre club. “It’s interesting because, like on Instagram, just seeing all the followers I’m gaining, it’s crazy because I did not promote it by myself on anything. Like I did not personally post about it. The first time I advertised [on Instagram], all these people, I had no idea who they were, random people started following it.” A single reel on the Lettuce Eating Club’s Instagram page has over 20,000 views, and counting, as it shows participants of the club racing against each other in the competition.

Yuen went on to add that her favorite part of the club was, “How you don’t have to participate in it, so you can kinda watch. Like people found out about the club the day the competition was. So that was fun, it brings everyone together.” 

It’s an amazing thing when so many different people can come together and bond over something as silly as eating lettuce.

Cassie Pan shared this belief when she first joined the club, saying it “Unite[s] our class and Northwest as a whole.” 

When asked if she was glad she joined the club, Pan said, “Yes, because I feel like we’re making history for Northwest as the first Northwest Lettuce Eating Club. Plus it’s just entertaining to watch them eat lettuce, I’m not gonna lie, it’s very entertaining.” 

Even on the first day of the meeting, people who never knew about the club prior to that day started to swarm Room 276, crowding around to see pairs of teams compete against each other. 

Going through some financial difficulties, however, the Lettuce Eating Club has yet to have another meeting, but there is hope for a new one to come soon.