How to Make Foods Brace-Friendly

Dentist Blog

When you have your braces fitted, your orthodontist is likely to give you a list of foods you shouldn't eat while your teeth are being sorted out. It's important to pay attention to these recommendations. After all, if you eat the wrong foods, you risk damaging the braces and their wires. However, some of the foods you're told to avoid can be made brace friendly with a little effort before you eat them and a few changes to the way you eat.

Change the Way You Prepare Food

Some of the foods you're told to avoid are just too hard for your braces; others may be too chewy. These kinds of foods may break or distort braces or their wires when you eat them as you normally would. For example, you may be told to avoid eating apples on the basis that the effort you have to put into biting into the fruit may damage your brace wires or even the braces themselves. This doesn't always mean that you can't eat foods that are flagged. You may be able to continue eating them with a few tweaks:

• Apples: You shouldn't eat apples whole while you're wearing braces, but you can eat them if you cut them up first. This way, you can bite into small pieces of apple rather than having to go at the whole apple. If you're worried about the skin, peel the apple before you cut it up.
• Carrots: Raw carrots pose the same kinds of problems as whole apples and you shouldn't bite into a whole raw carrot or even a large piece. If you don't want to cook carrots and prefer to eat them raw, cut them up into really small pieces to make them easier to chew.
• Crusty foods: Foods with chewy or hard crusts such as pizza may not be great for your braces. The issue here tends to be the crusts – just cut them off and you're good to go. Your orthodontist may also tell you not to eat crusty breads like baguettes. Again, biting into a hard bread that takes some effort to break up into chewable pieces can be hard on your braces. You can get round this by cutting the bread up into small bite-size pieces and maybe even sucking on it a bit to make it softer when it's in your mouth.
• Corn on the cob: If you try to bite into corn on the cob, you'll put too much pressure on your braces. You'll have to settle for corn off the cob instead if you want to eat this food.

Make Things Bite-Sized

It's a good idea to watch how you eat as well as what you eat when you're wearing braces. If you take a huge bite of something hard or something that is very chewy, like a soft bread bun, you may damage your braces. It's better to make sure that you eat small pieces of food that take less chewing. Try to get into the habit of cutting or breaking food up into pieces before you put it in your mouth rather than using your teeth to bite into it or to break it up.

Warning: Some foods just don't work with braces, no matter what you do to them. For example, there's no real safe way to eat chewing gum, sticky toffees, hard sweets and lollies or popcorn. You may just have to give up some foods until your orthodontic treatment is finished.

23 February 2016