Braces provide a great way to have a beautiful, straight smile, while also correcting jaw alignment issues. However, you need to adjust how you eat and what you eat when you're wearing them. Make sure you are extra careful to avoid or limit the following foods.

Foods You Should Never Eat

There are different categories of foods you should avoid or try to reduce eating when you have braces. Before too long, you will start recognizing when a food will be fine to eat, and when a food is far too much trouble. The first category includes food that you should try to avoid at all costs. These foods tend to be too hard and sticky, which not only makes it difficult to clean them from your braces, but can actually do damage to the brackets or wires. For this reason, avoid all hard nuts, such as almonds, along with shelled popcorn. Other hard foods that might be a little too hard for the braces include taco shells, pretzels, and hard candy. You should also avoid foods and candy that are especially sticky. Chewing ice is often not recommended since it can be too hard and damage your braces.

Foods to Break Up Before Eating

There are also some foods that you can eat, but really should be broken up before you eat. You want to be extra careful when eating foods like hard bread, French rolls, and sandwich rolls. Instead of biting into the bread or sandwich, tear off pieces and eat it that way. The majority of the hard bread is chewed by your molars instead of the front teeth where your braces might get affected. Similar foods that should be broken up or torn before eating include hamburgers and hot dogs, most meat products, pizza with a hard crust, and raw vegetables. If you have salad, it is usually best to skip the croutons. With corn, choose corn that is not on the cob as it is much easier to eat when you have braces.

Foods That Require Extra Cleaning

Lastly, there are some foods that you can eat, but will require pulling the foods from your braces. With the special cleaning, you might want to avoid these foods or at least reduce how often you eat them. For example, you can have sugarless chewing gum when you have braces, but it is difficult to chew it, and you might often be pulling pieces that get stuck in the brackets. The same can be said for tough meat or meat that is particularly stringy. Stringy vegetables also cause pieces to get stuck in you braces, such as celery and zucchini.

Talk to your dentist if you have more questions about what not to eat.