Foods on the Trail

Trail mix is honestly the first thing you’ll think of after reading this article’s title. But to be a little less cliche and a bit more creative, I’ve opted to come up with a list of snacks you can take with you while hiking that are filling, give a lot of energy, are small and inconspicuous enough to pack, and are dentist approved.

Note that serious hikers will likely care the most about conserving space in their packs, so dried food that can be cooked with water end up packing down the best and saving the most space. Some of these snacks may be better off for a single-day hike rather than a multi-day hike.

Without further adieu, here are a few snacks that make perfect on-the-go eats while you’re in the midst of wilderness and you’re craving something just after high noon. And like I mentioned before, these are all much healthier than other alternatives such as chips, candy, and even some of those high-calorie protein bars you see.

Jerky

Whether it’s venison, beef, turkey, or chicken, jerky is quite lightweight since all the water is removed from the meat. It also keeps extremely well and for a long time, and you’ll find that it lasts awhile while chewing on it so long as you don’t get carried away in eating too much. If you’re looking for a protein-packed snack that will boost your mood, excite your taste buds, and give you a little extra umph when you’re starting to tire, jerky is your best bet.

Seeds

Seeds are great because they don’t ruin your appetite but can satisfy any hunger pangs that you may have while your body is trekking along throughout the day. Opt for some sunflower seeds or kernels or even some pumpkin seeds if you’re looking for healthier variations of seeds. Try to stay away from artificially flavored sunflower seeds, though, as there is a lot of sodium, which can have adverse affects on your tired body while hiking.

Dried fruits

Sure, juicy and ripe fruits probably taste better and have a satisfying crunch to them when you bite in, but they take up a heck of a lot of space for a snack. Instead, opt for dried out fruits. While they won’t have the water content that regular fruits do, they’ll retain all of their healthy, nutritional value that will keep you energized for your hike.

If you do happen to take fruit that’s not dried out while you’re out in the great outdoors, do it on a day hike since you’ll have room to spare. The good thing about the food waste of fruit is that it’s au naturel. Feel free to toss your apple cores or banana peels, as they’ll be just fine decomposing in nature.

Smoking and Your Teeth

In life, it often feels like we don’t have as much time as we realize. We run and gun from one day to the next, feeling like there’s never enough time in the day, never enough time in the week, and never enough time in the month to get this task done or that project finished. Sometimes we’re right about that. We’re right about really just not having enough time to do all sorts of different things outside of work, and that’s because we’re usually exhausted.

But the majority of the time we’re just making excuses because we don’t care to commit our relaxing time to more productive tasks. But who can blame us? Americans work some of the longest hours in the developed world, so outside of work usually leaves us not wanting to do anything else.

But what about in life? Again, people say things like “life is too short” and whatnot. Is it really, though? Is 80 or so years really that short of a time to do all kinds of stuff? I don’t particularly tend to think so.

That’s the excuse people give themselves to indulge in their vices. And I’m not innocent of doing this myself, really. But when people say “life is too short to not ____”, that’s when bad habits can form. If drinking or smoking is to fill in that blank, it’s an excuse to ruin your health and shorten your life. So, yeah, no wonder life is too short.

Smoking, though, has particularly bad effects on your teeth. Especially if you smoke multiple cigarettes each and every day. When it comes to the negative effects of smoking that most people and places advertise, lung cancer is at the top of the list. Sometimes, though, another important disease is left on the back burner or played down as “not as bad.” That would be mouth diseases and even cancer.

This is usually something that attacks your gums. And without solid gum tissue, your teeth don’t have a foundation with which to support themselves. Consequently, they’re more likely to fall out or be dislodged from something as simple as chewing food.

Speaking of your teeth, they’re also quite heavily affected by habitual smoking. First and foremost, smoking can stain your teeth, making them appear yellow and sometimes brownish.

Just as well, smoking can create chronic bad breath. If anything, don’t let yourself smoke too much just so that your breath isn’t forever stinky. And if you want another reason to quit smoking, it’s because you love the taste of good foods. Because if you don’t stop soon or cut back on smoking, your ability to taste could be compromised down the road. To me, this sounds like my worst nightmare.

Phonics and Your Teeth

Phonics is one of those things you vaguely remember as a child in early elementary school. There were these workbooks that you’d have to practice your sounds in. And for the most part, those things really worked in getting children to speak correctly and learn to read. It was kind of a two birds with one stone thing for the school.

At times, I think those things should’ve extended far beyond elementary school. And that’s not because I think people just can’t speak without it. I just think that the focus of speaking and reading drops off quite a bit by the time kids hit middle school in America. It gets to the point that they’re expected to write papers in high school yet haven’t learn formal grammar and the likes for over 5 years. Instead, we push reading (which is really a misnomer, for the most part, considering it’s more about the comprehension of literature and devices in literature rather than actual reading, pronunciation, and grammar).

A big part of phonics, or learning to pronounce things, is knowing where the tongue should be in the mouth when a sound is uttered. So, that also means that the teeth are extremely important in pronunciation. Without your teeth, your tongue would be a free moving muscle without any support. You wouldn’t be able to make a lot of sounds in English without serious trouble, and for the most part, you would be extremely hard to understand.

So, it’s important to take care of your oral and dental health. A lot of people neglect these things because it seems like it won’t happen until the end of your life anyway. Well, this isn’t always the case. Oftentimes, it’s not uncommon to hear of people losing their front teeth in an accident or even having some of their molars rot because of neglect. These things, ultimately, will affect your speech more than you ever thought.

While most people preach the benefits of healthy teeth long into your life, they often forget to include how important teeth are to speech. Of course it’s hard to eat without teeth. We all realize that. It’s just that speech should be included in those warnings, too.

So, the next time you “forget” to brush your teeth, think a few decades down the road instead. Think about how much you like to blabber on about things. Think about how much you enjoy eating good food uninterrupted. If anything, those two aspects about life should make you revisit the bathroom sink to get a nice, quality brush in.