Braces-friendly food
It hadn't occurred to me until recently that the inconveniences of having braces include not being able to eat a lot of things easily.
Hard foods. Sticky foods. Stuff that's difficult to brush away.
If you're dealing with these issues in your house, you might want to check out this link from the American Association of Orthodontists, which offers "braces-friendly recipes" from chefs like Chicago's Gale Gand.
That's her Chocolate-Baked Bananas Over Ice Cream at right. You can watch a video of Gand making the recipe here.
Just how painful, or not, has your experience with braces been? I'm sure parents with up-and-coming brace wearers (I may be included in this group) would love to hear how you've helped your children through it. Please tell us by commenting below.
(Photo courtesy of the American Association of Orthodontists)
Comments
My children don't have braces yet but my memories of wearing them are VIVID. My mouth was painfully small for all the metal that was stuck in there, I had a lot of teeth pulled, the monthly tightening resulted in me having to eat pudding, yogurts and baby food fruits because it was so painful. Braces were worse for me than having the wisdom teeth pulled when I was 18. I do recall my parents kind of said well, if she can't have popcorn, etc then none of us will have it. that was nice since popcorn was a favorite for family movie night. I would have felt terrible being the only one left out....when you were 9, no popcorn was tragic.
Posted by: Christine | March 7, 2008 8:56 AM
ugh.. right now i can say that braces are terrible; my teeth hurt even when they aren't touching, my entire jaw aches, and i can't even chew a piece of white bread... braces=misery
Posted by: Anonymous | November 13, 2008 6:49 PM
This isn't really helpful. At all. You're not supposed to eat food high in carbohydrates, and also it's not like she's going to be eating ice cream for breakfast.
Posted by: Anonymous | January 9, 2009 4:07 PM
I think this was written to show fun ways to eat while wearing braces, just make sure you brush and use the platypus flosser!
Posted by: Jake | March 24, 2009 6:40 PM
The AAO's website (www.braces.org) gives lots of ideas for healthy soft-food eating, not just desserts. And they always stress brushing and flossing. This way, you don't have to feel totally deprived, but you'll avoid breaking off brackets since that delays your treatment.
Posted by: Pamela Waterman | January 26, 2010 12:09 PM