Worst Foods for Your Teeth – What Are They?

Excerpt: Nobodies absolutely perfect when it comes to eating foods that are good for your teeth...

Posted on: June 1, 2022

Nobodies absolutely perfect when it comes to eating foods that are good for your teeth. There are even some foods that are even worse for your teeth that people don’t realize. Having these foods every now and again won’t cause you significant problems in your oral health, but if you constantly consume them, and maintain subpar dental health practices, then you will experience tooth decay.

If you need advice on oral care, you can check out our ultimate teeth cleaning guide!

What Are The Worst Foods For Your Teeth?

Having great dental health affects numerous aspects of your life, if you let your teeth deteriorate to the point where they need to be extracted, or they fall out, it can be detrimental.

It’s always a better option to keep your original teeth where they are, instead of looking for solutions. Certain foods are much worse for your teeth than others, here is a list of a few of them!

Sweet Treats And Candies

Candies and sugar-laden foods are infamous for promoting tooth decay. The naturally occurring bacteria in your mouth digest carbs and produce plaque and tartar (calculus). These foods are also typically chewy, tough to break down, and hard to clean. This means that they are likely to stay in your mouth for a long period of time.

Candies also tend to get stuck in between the crevices of your teeth which can promote decay in areas that are exceedingly tough to clean. If you do have a sweet tooth, the best way to consume candies is to brush your teeth directly after you eat them.

Problem foods for your teeth include:

Gummies
Cakes, donuts, etc.
Caramel
Hard candies

Try to limit the intake of these foods, your gums and teeth will thank you.

Soft Drinks, Energy Drinks, Fruit Juice

Soft drinks, energy drinks, and fruit juice all contain lots of sugar, they create an acidic environment in your mouth, and they do not provide much of a health benefit. Even if the drinks are sugar-free, they can still promote significant tooth decay, it is advisable to cut back on these products due to their dangerous nature.

You might be surprised to see fruit juice on this list. Fruit juice is misleading since it is heavily processed, and lots of the health benefits are removed during the processing. Extra sugar might even be added as well, this can lead you to believe drinking it is a healthy alternative when it is definitely not.

Pickled Foods

Vinegar is used during the pickling process, vinegar is naturally very acidic. If you eat acidic foods on a regular basis, you may be promoting tooth decay without knowing it. The acid will cause your tooth enamel to erode and deteriorate over time.

Wine

While alcohol in general is not great for your teeth, wine is one of the worst culprits. Red wine has a significant amount of tannins. Tannins stain your teeth by sticking to the plaque, to minimize the chance of staining your teeth, brush your teeth before and after. This will reduce the amount of plaque, which will hopefully cause less staining on your teeth.

Citrus Fruits

Fruits are incredibly healthy to eat, you can drastically improve your overall health just by adding more of them to your diet. But, you should know that they can adversely affect your teeth. Fruit can cause acid to form in your mouth. It’s a good idea to eat fruits, but you will want to clean your teeth after doing so.

Crackers And Chips

These foods have similar issues when it comes to oral health. The main issue is that they’re both high in carbohydrates, and they can easily get stuck between your teeth. To make matters worse, they are quite difficult to clean, which means they could potentially stay in your mouth longer than you might expect.

Sports Drinks

Sports drinks are often advertised as a super healthy alternative to quench your thirst. They’re often advertised with healthy-looking people that are active and play sports. This might give you the impression that’s perfectly ok to drink them. Many sports drinks have almost as much sugar as pop and will cause at least as much tooth decay. If you’re looking to restore your electrolytes, stick to water.

Tomatoes

Tomatoes are a super healthy food to eat for a number of reasons, except for at least one. They can cause your mouth to turn acidic, due to their nature. If you’re eating them as part of a dish that contains pasta, rice, or other carb sources, you could unknowingly cause dental health issues.

Apple Cider Vinegar

In the last few years, apple cider vinegar has exploded onto the market as a healthy addition to your diet. While it definitely has health benefits, it also has drawbacks to your health.

Dried Fruits

Dried fruits can be easy to eat because of how condensed they are. The issue is not the fact that you’re eating more fruit, it’s that your eating a higher percentage of sugar with dried fruit than normal fruit. Water can fill you up, and help with the digestion of the sugary foods. Dried fruits have little water in them, so the effect is two-fold.

Should I Stop Eating These Foods?

No! Lots of these foods offer lots of benefits to your health and they taste great too! However, too much of a good thing is a bad thing, so we hope that you are exercising caution in your daily diet. As long as you are eating a balanced mix of healthy and unhealthy foods you are doing great!

If you find you are eating too much unhealthy food, you should listen to your body, it will definitely give you warning signs.