English Reference
Idiom idiom

swallow the leek

Meaning

To change one's mind.

Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Examples
SIMPLE

“He had to swallow the leek and admit he was wrong.”

CONTEXTUAL

“After arguing for hours that his plan was best, he finally had to swallow the leek when the data proved him wrong.”

COMPLEX

“The politician was forced to swallow the leek and support the new policy, despite having spent months campaigning against it in public.”

Anchors to
Related idioms4entries
  1. 01

    hard to swallow

    Difficult to accept; hard to acquiesce to.

  2. 02

    swallow a bitter pill

    To accept or endure an unpleasant situation.

  3. 03

    swallow one's pride

    To set aside one's feelings of pride and adopt a more humble or appropriate stance.

  4. 04

    swallow the dictionary

    To speak using long or obscure words.

Last updated August 10, 2026