Do whole grains damage your teeth

[Lissa]

@StarvingButStrong

In societies where women (usually) grind grain between two stone surfaces, you end up with a bit of stone grit ‘contamination’ in the result. You’ve got to think that biting down on even a small amount of stone dust will do damage to your teeth as the years go by.

@mks57

When I took a class in physical anthropology, I examined some skulls of people who had subsisted largely on stone-ground flour. Most of them had moderate to severe wear on their teeth.

As I understand, the teeth of ancient Egyptians show the worst of this “grit-wear” because of sand which is not only created when flour is stone-ground, but from tiny particles which blows into food when it’s prepared out in the open or in homes without window screens.

You see a lot of wear on the teeth of ancient Native American women, not only from stone-ground grains but from the pratice of chewing hides to help soften them.