HALLOWEEN TENDS TO come with a lot of sugar and a lot of treats on the banned foods list for orthodontic patients. Let’s just take a minute and go over the best and worst types of treats for teeth and braces. 😬
Anything hard, sticky, or sour is going to be bad for teeth. 🍭 Hard candy takes a while to dissolve, which means teeth are exposed to sugar for a long time, and it can easily break a bracket loose. Even the nuts in soft candy bars pose a risk.
Sticky candy is a problem because it adheres to teeth and braces. That’s like breakfast in bed for bacteria! Sour candy might not pose the same dangers to brackets, but it contains acid as well as sugar, so it’s doubly bad for teeth.
Luckily, not all candy is awful for oral health or dangerous for braces-wearers. Chocolate is on the good end of the oral health spectrum, and the darker, the better. Chocolate contains compounds that limit oral bacteria, fight bad breath, and slow tooth decay. Dark chocolate has more of these compounds and their benefits are less offset by sugar than in milk chocolate. 🍫
Other candies that are safe to eat with braces and not terrible for teeth include mint patties, peanut butter cups, and nut-free chocolate bars. These are soft and not too sticky, so biting into them doesn’t risk breaking brackets. 👍