What to Eat After Teeth Whitening
What to Eat After Teeth Whitening and 5 Types of Foods to Avoid
Your smile becomes brighter after you get your teeth whitened at the dentist. To make that smile last longer, eat certain foods after your professional whitening and avoid others. If you have trouble remembering lists, here is a shortcut: Anything you think could stain a white shirt, don’t eat or drink. In other words, skip mustard, chocolate, and strawberries, and drink plenty of water. Here are other top tips on what to eat after teeth whitening.
What to Eat After Teeth Whitening: 16 Types of Foods that are OK
A professional whitening temporarily exposes your dentin layer and turns your teeth slightly porous. Your dentin layer is the second layer of a tooth, with enamel being the top layer. The dentin layer covers the pulp and is the most visible part of a tooth.
Given the dentin layer exposure and your teeth’s temporarily porous nature, staining and discoloration are real risks if you eat certain foods. Enamel decay is also a risk with certain sugars. Stick with white and light-colored drinks and foods for two days (48 hours) after your whitening. You should talk to your dentist for details and in general follow what is called the white diet.
- Water: Water is usually your ally no matter the situation. After teeth whitening, water presents zero tooth staining and enamel degradation risks, so indulge in it all you want.
- Chicken, turkey, fish, and tofu: Eat these foods as plainly as possible and avoid ketchup, mustard, and colorful sauces and condiments. White sauces are fine.
- Pasta and rice: Eat a lot of rice and pasta if you want, but do avoid food that lists food coloring in the ingredients.
- Bread: Similar to pasta, check bread ingredient labels for food colorings and molasses. Otherwise, chow down.
- Fruits and vegetables: Go light-colored — for example, stick with fresh apples, bananas, and pears for fruits. For vegetables, eat potatoes and cauliflower.
- Yogurt and white cheese: The plainer the yogurt and the whiter the cheese, the better. Watch out for flavored yogurts and artificial colors because of the enamel risks.
- Eggs: Scramble them to protect your teeth from the bright yolk pigments.
- Bagels: Cream cheese is fine to add to your bagel. Skip jellies and jams.
- Cereals: They are fine to have as long as they are not sugary. Feel free to have them with milk.
- Banana smoothies: Wait a few days to have other types of smoothies such as a strawberry smoothie.
- Pizza: Enjoy pizza with white sauce. Don’t get red sauce or marinara.
- Cheese: If you guessed you should eat white cheese and not golden yellow, you guessed correctly.
- Sandwiches: Feel free to eat a basic sandwich, meaning no colorful mustard, ketchup, and jellies. For example, plain chicken on bread is fine. Skip steak and other red meats.
- White beans: Choose white or lighter-colored beans, bypassing black beans and their darker-colored counterparts.
- Salads: Spring for macaroni or potato salads. Salads with lettuce will have to wait.
- White potato chips and saltine crackers: Enjoy a dash of salt and crunch.
All in all, you have a lot of options for foods to eat after whitening procedures. If you have been on the fence about whitening because of that, this information may help. Professional teeth whitening can be a huge asset for you personally and professionally, even if your teeth are already in good shape.
What Not to Eat After Teeth Whitening: 5 Types of Foods to Avoid
Not all light-colored foods and drinks are fine to consume after teeth whitening. For instance, avoid white wines and light-colored sodas because of the potential risk to tooth enamel even if they do not pose discoloration risks. Water is your best bet for a safe drink to consume after a dental whitening procedure.
- Sodas and soft drinks: Steer clear of even white sodas such as Sprite. That is because the sugar and acid in soda can wreak havoc with your tooth enamel. Of course, you want to avoid darker-colored sodas as well. They are worse and could stain your teeth. Bottom line: If something fizzes, avoid it.
- Coffee and tea: The inclusion of these two items probably does not come as a surprise. Avoid them for at least two days, more if possible. Coffee and tea have tannins, which are chemical compounds that lead to a somewhat bitter flavor. Tannins also give color to some types of tea.
Tannins have their benefits but are not friendly to the color of your teeth. They can accumulate over time and make your teeth darker. After a tooth whitening, they can invade your temporarily porous teeth and cause even more destruction.
- Red and white wine: White wine is light-colored but you still need to avoid it after whitening your teeth. Similar to light-colored sodas, white wine is bad news for your enamel. Definitely do not drink red wine, as it affects both enamel and tooth color.
- Dark fruits, dark juices, and fruit juices: As mentioned earlier, apples are great to eat. However, blackberries, blueberries, cherries, and other fruits with dark colors and dark juices are not.
- Candy and chocolate: Your teeth are extra sensitive and do not need to deal with refined sugars. Sugars can accelerate discoloration and erosion. This is why you should skip the white chocolate, too.
What To Eat After Teeth Whitening: Meal Ideas
Given the lists of what to eat and what not to eat, you get a good idea of the options in play for meal ideas. For breakfast, you could have eggs, bagels, and white cheese, for example.
Lunch could be a chicken breast and white beans. Dinner could be pizza with white sauce. For snacks, you could munch on apples, bananas, or white yogurt.
What To Eat After Teeth Whitening: Contact Lakeshore Dental With Questions
If you recently had your teeth whitened or are considering the procedure, it is natural to wonder about what to eat after teeth whitening. Contact us at Lakeshore Dental today to discuss our teeth whitening processes and the various reasons to consider whitening.
Sources:
Very Well Health
Muscaro and Martini Dentistry
Healthline
Serene Dental Center
Dentists in Alexandria