How to deal with red wine stained teeth

August 7, 2007 11:12 PM

How do you deal with red wine staining your teeth purple during an evening out?

I'm sure it's not only me that worries about this. I enjoy drinking red wine, especially in Winter, but I hate how it stains my front teeth purple after a couple of glasses.

I always think this looks really unclassy on other people, so I now avoid drinking more than one glass of red in an evening.

How do others deal with it? Secret toothbrush in the handbag?

posted by anonymous to food & drink (11 answers total)

Brush-Ups to the rescue. Their minty flavor does conflict with the enjoyment of wine's flavor, however, thus do try to work in a thorough rinse after swabbing.
posted by jamaro at 11:37 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

Try to drink some water after each sip of red wine.

"Eating a bit of cheese or even simply rinsing your mouth thoroughly with water will help in the meantime. In the realm of useless advice for wine enthusiasts, a "tooth whitening expert" on MSNBC television once recommended avoiding the stains by sipping your red wine through a straw. I don't think so."

"In another approach to alleviating purple teeth after a tasting, Michael Amigoni suggested a simple solution: "Just like white wine is used to get the stains out of a spill on a rug, my experience is to swirl some white wine in your mouth and it cleans it all up!"
posted by iviken at 11:41 PM on August 7, 2007

Models drink red wine and cola through a straw. They find other uses for straws as well, it seems.

nthing ivken (halfway at least). Cheese works.
posted by solongxenon at 12:13 AM on August 8, 2007 [1 favorite]

You think it looks unclassy? I've always thought it was kind of sexy (on other people, I've never really cared much about how it looks on me since if I've drunk enough wine to have stained teeth I'm well past the caring what other people think threshold)
posted by lastobelus at 2:20 AM on August 8, 2007

Do you use any sort of teeth whitening system? When I did that before our wedding, I noticed it made my teeth much more porous, and hence much more suseptible to staining from red wine.
posted by tr33hggr at 5:16 AM on August 8, 2007

It wipes off with a napkin.
posted by kisch mokusch at 5:52 AM on August 8, 2007

I drink whites or rose.
posted by extrabox at 6:20 AM on August 8, 2007

Go to the bathroom first and put a tiny bit of vaseline on your teeth.
posted by HotPatatta at 8:20 AM on August 8, 2007

I've found that only tannin rich/heavy/cheap red wine stains. You could try drinking something lighter, like a Beaujolais, or splash out for the good stuff.
posted by low_horrible_immoral at 9:08 AM on August 8, 2007

I've never tried the GoSMILE Touch Ups, but they seem to be what you're looking for. They're kind of expensive, but for an important date or event it might be worth it. They say it "Instantly erases food and drink stains before they set" (and if they say it, it must be true, right?)
posted by robinpME at 10:09 AM on August 8, 2007

i swish water once in a while.
the white wine idea is genius, though.
posted by twistofrhyme at 6:09 PM on August 8, 2007