Tooth-Friendly, Healthy Snacks on the Go (4 Tips)

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Whether it’s the work commute, driving back and forth to see a loved one in the hospital, or just a vacation drive, finding healthy snacks on the go can be a challenge. A few weeks of cavity-causing snacks could result in a lot of havoc for your teeth—including newly sensitive teeth.

Fortunately, there are more tooth-friendly options for on-the-go snacking than you might think. And if a new snacking habit has resulted in some tooth sensitivity, this article can help you locate the possible culprit.

Let’s look at the best way to keep your teeth strong and cavity-free, even on the road. But first, I’d like to share with you the moment I realized how important this was in my own life.

Krista’s Story

During many dental visits in the past, my dentist kindly warned me I was eating too much sugar and foods that weren’t good for my dental and overall health. (Basically, I was wrecking my oral microbiome…more on why that matters here.)

It wasn’t until 2009 when the doctor explained to me what was going on that I began to take my health seriously.

“Krista, you have maybe three months to live—the cancer is growing rapidly and if you don’t do something, you may be out of time.”

In that moment, I knew I needed to put up a fight and make some serious changes. I began seeing a nutritionist to expand my knowledge on plant-based nutrition and how to change my diet and support my fight against cancer.

But with a life full of hospital trips, I struggled to find healthy snacks on the go readily available. Many times, I found myself circling gas stations and convenience stores and walking out empty handed. Besides a bottle of water or an over-salted pack of almonds, I would go hungry instead of opting for something unhealthy.

The lack of access to healthy foods began to eat at me. As someone fighting a life-threatening disease at the time, it seemed impossible to stay healthy while on the go. I was forced to pack food with me, and many months I found my pantry bare because of the overwhelming hospital bills eating at my savings account.

Suffice it to say that this was an impossible situation to be in while fighting for my life.

I couldn’t help but think of all of the other people in the U.S. struggling with the same problem.

After winning my battle with cancer, I decided to do something about it. I launched a company called ESSTAR and “Krista’s Healthy On The Go” kiosks that sell healthy snack foods. I now focus on making food available in gas stations, convenience stores, hospitals, colleges and cafeterias across the U.S—some of the places where good nutrition is most needed and most ignored. (Read more about this “food desert” dilemma here and my cancer recovery story here.)

Fighting cancer or not, most of us are on-the-go all the time. But you don’t have to sacrifice healthy teeth for being busy! From cancer recovery to entrepreneurship, I’ve been busy the last several years. These experiences have led me to these four tips for preventing cavities—and staying healthy in general.

4 Tips for Healthy Snacks on the Go

Snacking on the road is problematic when it comes to dental health because teeth need a chance to remineralize. If you’re munching on sweets, sipping soda, and foregoing good brushing habits (because who hasn’t done that on vacation?), cavities can quickly form.

Find yourself struggling to find healthy snacks on the go? Here are some tips:

1. Plan Ahead

Take a few minutes to prepare before you leave the house. When you’ve got baggies full of healthy snacks, you can cut down on the temptation to satiate your hunger with processed, sugar-rich foods.

When thinking of snacks on the road, consider things that won’t get mushy or that need to stay fresh or refrigerated.

Some of my favorite healthy snacks to pack that are great for your teeth include:

• Fresh fruit: Try blueberries, strawberries, bananas, and raspberries. The water in fresh fruit makes them a tooth-friendly choice. But watch out for dried fruit—sugars in dry fruit are really concentrated and can stick to teeth just like candy.
• Veggie slices: Some of the best are carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, celery, or cherry tomatoes. Many grocery stores offer pre-sliced veggies or packs of cherry tomatoes or sugar snap peas that are simple and portable.
• Nuts: My favorites are almonds, cashews, or pecans. Nuts make a great buffer for sugar sticking to your teeth, so if you’re going to splurge a little with a candy bar, for instance, make sure to eat nuts, too.
• Healthy trail mix: Avoid the dried fruit; it’s full of sugar!
• Homemade kale chips: These are one of my favorite healthy snacks on the go. They’ve got everything you need for great nutrition—a super food, healthy fat, and portability!

Pro tip: To make a really great trail mix that your teeth will love, use the following ingredients:

1. Almonds
2. Cashews
3. Chocolate chips (I love this brand because they don’t use processed sugar to sweeten)
4. Pumpkin seeds
5. Dried coconut

If you’ve never tried this trail mix, you should. It’ll make you forget you’re eating healthy!

2. Check Yelp

The Yelp app has saved the day for me many times while looking for healthy snacks on the go. While traveling, I use it to locate a local juice or smoothie bar, health food store, or similar establishment. It’s fascinating to discover the creations of local artisans, and I’m often pleasantly surprised with the healthy options available in even smaller towns.

Here’s an easy way to find great, tooth-friendly food nearby. Just open the Yelp app and search for “healthy food” and then click the “Open Now” option. Voila! You’ll be able to see open restaurants advertised as healthy fare.

3. Hack Convenience Store Eating

Look for the cooler! This is where you’ll find things like:

• Yogurt (watch for the sugar count here, but many yogurts are good probiotic foods)
• Salads
• Hard-boiled eggs (bonus points for vitamin K2-rich, grass-fed eggs)
• String cheese
• Fruit cups
• Vegetable trays
• Seaweed packs (yes, this sounds weird, but they’re actually delicious!)

Not everything in the coolers will be healthy, but many of the healthy options are found there.

If you’re fortunate enough to be in a gas station with a “healthy” section, that can be a great place to check out, too. Some of the better gas station snacks outside the cooler are:

• Beef jerky (without soy and added sugar)
• Protein bars low in sugar content
• Sugar-free gum (the xylitol here is actually great for remineralizing teeth)

4. Choose Better Drinks

Instead of soda or sugar-packed juices or sweet teas, try to find something less acidic and sugar-filled. I generally advise avoiding diet drinks, although these are technically sugar-free.

Some of my favorite healthy drinks from gas stations include:

• Bottled water
• Unsweetened tea
• Sparkling/mineral water (like La Croix, Deer Park Sparkling Water, and Topo Chico)
• Kombucha (I like GT’s, which has the lowest sugar content per serving)
• Sugar-free or low sugar drinks sweetened with honey, monk fruit, or stevia

Ingredients to Avoid in Snack Food

Many snack foods available today are high in refined carbohydrates and sugar, which are not only bad for teeth but can make you feel sluggish, unsatisfied, and hungrier faster. Between extending the time you’re exposing your teeth to these cavity-causing ingredients and increasing your craving for more of those foods, bad snacking can create a fast spiral.

Flavor enhancers, preservatives, sweeteners, synthetic colors, and man-made fats and chemicals often hide out in the processed foods we eat. Many of these ingredients are inflammatory and interfere with your body’s pH balance (more on how that works here).

Don’t forget—tooth decay and gum disease are both diseases. It’s easy to think of them as different than an illness elsewhere in the body, but they fall into the same category.

By eating inflammatory, acidic ingredients in food, you’re setting the stage for a body that’s less able to fight disease (in your mouth or anywhere else).

But which ingredients are actually harmful? What should you look for on a snack label on your next road trip?

The Food Babe has a great list of additives in processed foods that I (mostly) agree are great to avoid. Check out her full list here.

Best High-Protein Foods On-the-Go

The key is to make sure your healthy snacks on the go are nutritious and contain protein. Protein promotes fullness because it signals the release of appetite-suppressing hormones, slows digestion, and stabilizes blood sugar levels.

Plus, many high-protein snacks are low in ingredients that bad oral bacteria love to feed on.

Here are some high-protein snacks that are healthy and portable:

• Beef jerky
• Trail mix
• Nut mixes
• Greek yogurt
• Nut butters
• Hard-boiled eggs
• Tuna
• Protein bars
• Protein shakes

When You Have a “Flex” Day on the Road

It’s unrealistic for most of us to eat “perfectly” 100% of the time—not just because there are so many different versions of “perfect” when it comes to food.

To protect your teeth from decay, here are a few ways you can offset the impact of sugary or processed sweets on your next trip:

1. Drink a lot of water. Water creates a buffer between your teeth and bacteria-friendly foods, so make the extra bathroom stops and opt for more water.
2. Try dry brushing. Toothpaste isn’t actually as big a deal as you might think. You can disorganize your biofilm just as efficiently by dry brushing—just using a toothbrush without paste. It’s a great idea to keep a travel brush in your glove box or purse for times when you need an extra brush away from your sink.
3. Eat “flex” foods in small spurts. The amount of time sugar and other acidic ingredients are exposed to your teeth is an important element in cavity formation. If you’re going to treat yourself with a less healthy snack option, don’t snack for hours; eat or drink your treat quickly and then buffer with water.
4. Plan when to “flex” and stick to your plan. Just because the occasional sugary snack probably won’t kill you isn’t a reason to toss your healthy diet altogether. Plan ahead when you’ll have a “flex” snack or meal, and stick to what you decide.

Key Takeaways: Tooth-Friendly, Healthy Snacks On the Go

It’s easy to go for the convenient, less-healthy option when you’re looking for snacks on the go. However, there are options for eating healthy snacks on the go that won’t contribute to cavities.

My top tips for eating healthy while traveling are:

1. Plan ahead
2. Check Yelp for healthy options in the area
3. Hack convenience store eating
4. Choose better drinks

After my experience with the inaccessibility of healthy food on the go, I set out to make a change. That’s why I created ESSTAR, which supplies convenience stores with kiosks called “Krista’s Healthy On-the-Go.” I carefully choose products for those shelves that have recognizable, limited ingredient lists and that promote better health for your teeth and body.

Want to know if a gas station on your route has a Krista’s Healthy-on-the-Go station? Go to esstar.us, where you can find our locations with organic, gluten-free, vegan, paleo and allergen-free snacks.

If you would like to see healthy snack options in a store near you, please feel free to go to ESSTAR’s website and suggest a location.

read next: Vitamin K2 Foods: Top Choices for Healthy Teeth

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