Why do you need natural toothpaste?
Commercial toothpaste contains flouride
There is a lot of debate about Flouride and whether it does or doesn’t have negative effects on our bodies. It is a key ingredient in most tubes of toothpaste that you find in the grocery store today. It also gets added to the local water supplies in most parts of the U.S. I don’t want to start a big debate about whether it is good that it is put into our water supply or not, but just know that even the supporters of flouride use agree that too much can lead to Fluorosis.
Personally, I am a bit of a natural health freak and try to avoid flouride and if you are like me you are well aware that there are few options in the grocery store. Even a lot of the natural and organic toothpastes seem to contain flouride.
Other artificial ingredients
But, regardless of where you stand on the flouride issue, there are many other artificial ingredients contained in commercial toothpaste, like sweeteners (usually saccharin), emulsifiers, preservatives, and artificial flavors. While they may not be as bad as drinking bleach, they aren’t benefiting your body.
Make your own toothpaste
I decided to do some digging and see what it actually takes to make your own toothpaste. It turns out it only requires a few natural and easy to find ingredients. I don’t have kids yet, but this seems like one of those projects that may be good to get your kids involved with. I know I never wanted to brush my teeth when I was 5, but this might have made it more fun!
Ingredients needed to make natural toothpaste
- Baking soda (works as a natural cleansing agent and it polishes and whitens your teeth as well!)
- Table salt
- Hydrogen Peroxide (naturally disinfects your mouth)
- Stevia (optional as sweetener)
- Peppermint oil (optional)
Both 4 and 5 can be found at a health food store
Steps to make your toothpaste
- Pour 1/2 cup baking soda into a mixing bowl
- Add a dash of salt
- Add 1/4 cup of hydrogen peroxide
- Add 1 drop of peppermint oil
- Add a dash of stevia (more if you want it sweeter)
- Mix it all up until it becomes paste like. You may have to add more hydrogen peroxide to get the right consistency.
A few notes about the homemade toothpaste
- You can store it in a plastic container to keep it from drying out.
- If you’re not into the peppermint flavor, you could try ground cinnamon or vanilla extract.
Another quick and easy option is to get Peppermint extract (1/4 tsp.) from the Spice section of the grocery store and mix it with 1 tbsp. of baking soda. Add a dash of salt, mix it up, and you are good to go.
In trying this out, I thought I added a dash of salt, apparently I added way too much because it tasted like the Gulf of Mexico. Next time, I am going to lay off the salt. Brushing with it felt nice and left my teeth feeling so fresh and so clean, clean! I think I am going to try it with cinnamon next time to see what that tastes like.
{ 35 comments… read them below or add one }
“In trying this out, I thought I added a dash of salt, apparently I added way too much because it tasted like the Gulf of Mexico.”
–Now that made me laugh.
Interesting post, Bob. Jamey and I will have to try that.
That’s what I am here for tristan!
We’ve known about the dangers of fluoride for a while. I just use plain baking soda and my kids use Aerobic 07 drops. Can’t get my husband to give up his toothpaste, though. I’ll give this a try. I think we’d like the cinnamon or vanilla flavor.
And did you know that stevia is actually good for your teeth? There are whole books on the subject.
@kyria
I didn’t know that, but I still think it is funny that the FDA won’t allow it to be labeled as a sweetener
Interesting that you mentioned adding stevia to the toothpaste. I read another post this week about stevia as an alternative to sugar and artificial sweeteners. Very interesting. Never new you could make toothpaste with a few ingredients. would be a fun school project.
I stumbled it.
Yea, stevia is a pretty amazing herb from everything I know about it… thanks for the stumble
This post has been included in the 141st Festival of Frugality at Almost Frugal, going live September 2, 2008. Please make sure to link back to the Festival and or submit it to sites like Digg, Stumble Upon, PF Buzz etc. Thanks for participating!
Flourosis is only a danger for children, and you can get flouride-free children’s toothpaste. The benefits of flouride for teeth are tested and well-understood, and as an adult I’ll not be passing on that.
History and “old fashion things” are fun, but I’ll not be giving up modern dental progress for the way things used to be.
@Don
I enjoy the modern conveniences, but as I discover that some of them come at such a tremendous cost (i.e. long term health problems) I am looking for ways to get back to the ways things used to be – before everything was made with chemicals…
As a poor loan laden dental student I read a few financial blogs to help me to use my money wisely. The rest of the time I study and “practice dentistry”. As a semi-educated individual on the subject I would ask you to please not advise people to make their own toothpaste. If you are reading this post please do not make your own toothpaste at home using a technique popular prior to WW2. People with a complete understanding of the De-mineralization –> Re-mineralization cycle of hydroxyapatite, Acid base chemistry, the Henderson hasselback equation, Solubility Product Constant (Ksp)
plaque formation, plaque composition and colonization, bacteria metabolic systems, cariogenic Micro flora, and Fluoride and its role in the re-mineralization of carious lesions and ………………..have developed modern day dentifrices as delivery mechanisms for chemotherapeutic agents to fight caries, gingivitis, and periodontitis. Hundreds, if not thousands of articles have been published in scientific journals about the benefits of fluoride in toothpaste and how it prevents tooth decay. Please use a fluoridated toothpaste with the ADA’s seal of approval signifying that evidence has been demonstrated scientifically from multiple long term studies that the product is both safe and effective. Use a pea sized amount and if you are worried don’t swallow any. Also, direct evidence from working with patients and one full year of oral pathology has convinced me never to put hydrogen peroxide in my mouth (It does not react very well with the oral mucosa) unless I am whitening my teeth with a safe and controlled commercial product. If you save $1 dollar every 4 months by making your own toothpaste it will take you 13 years to save enough money to have one filling placed in a dental school, and 66 years to save enough money to have one filling placed by private practice dentist. I don’t think it’s worth it.
@Q
I appreciate your perspective on this and while I don’t want to start a debate about modern vs. alternative health care, I can understand where you are coming from.
Thanks for your contribution to my “Take Charge of Your Health Care Carnival.” I was advised many years ago by a periodontist to use baking soda and peroxide. Adding the stevia and pepperment oil just makes it more palatable and helps freshen the breath. Sounds like a good combination to me.
hey well i just wanted to say that toothpaste is what i will enjoy and i use the toothpaste like im suppose to
I want to now if you put food grad hydrogen peroxide in it
Or not. tabitha mohr
I tend to agree with Q, that it would be more frugal to buy good toothpaste and use very little of it. As the debate about alternative health, well I’ll leave it to those who really care about stuff like that.
I go way back to ditto the first comment on the Gulf of Mexico line – hilarious.
2 comments: I agree with Q – Much of my family is connected with dentistry in one way or another – he’s right.
The other comment is about stevia. I have used it for various applications – I even baked a cheesecake using stevia almost exclusively! No one noticed, although I did tell them, as I wanted to let the guests know what was so unique about dessert that night. I give my kids the occasional red dye treatment with Koolaid – but I make it with 1/4 teaspoon (yes, that’s right!)ultra-concentrated stevia along with 2 tablespoons sugar (this small amount of sugar simply takes away the wierd-ish aftertaste of the stevia) – guests/kids cannot tell the difference, are consuming a lot less sugar, and it’s better for oral health. (BTW – the stuff is easy to grow, as well)
There’s my 2 cents.
Once you make the toothpaste, how do you get it in the tube?
Mix Gooseberry (Amblica Officinalis) powder, Haritaki (Terminalia Chebula)fruit powder and Bibhitaki (Terminalia Bellirica) fruit powder in equal amounts and store in glass jar. Use this powder as a tooth powder. This is much better and safe than the above product. Neem leaf paste or tender neem stick can also be used for cleaning teeth.
The above recipe looks interesting, though some ingredients may be difficult to find. But a comment regarding fluoride. I recently read that fluoride lessens cavities by 20-30% (not actually that great, however much the pro-fluoride people advocate it), while zylitol, a natural sweetener derived from wood, lessens cavities by 60-70%, and it doesn’t have the harmful effects fluoride does. (Fluoride may remineralize the tooth structure, but it pulls electrons out of the enamel and thus harms it). Zylitol already exists in a commercial toothpaste, though that toothpaste still has the disadvantage of having glycerine, which coats the teeth and prevents re-enamilization of the teeth, which otherwise happens naturally. Zylitol is easily found in many grocery stores (found it today at Whole Foods myself). Just need to figure out a recipe for a toothpaste or powder with it.
Correction to my comment about glycerine. See http://mizar5.com/keyes.html, which gives a Dr. Keyes findings about that. That site has some good info. And it’s Xylitol, not as I typo’d above.
I am a third year chemistry student of KNUST. I want to use the white latex of jatropha to make a natural toothpaste. How do i do that? I am working on it as my project.
was this hard i am going to do this for sience fair.
Fluoride is a toxic chemical. I don’t care what schooling you have. I know its fun and makes you feel good to show everyone what you know. I’ve been taught many lies in school….high school, undergrad and graduate. Bottom line, fluoride is TOXIC. It may help with tooth decay, but other things do too. Why not choose the non-toxic thing that prevents tooth decay?
I agree with Matt on Q’s comments. I have also been handed many lies in H.S., college, and grad school. And while the information above had good intentions, I felt the lengthy lecture with industry jargon to be a little patronizing. (Mentioning loan debt doesn’t equal reliability and expertise and pre-WWII methods of health care are only as illegitimate as the value systems that we place on them are.)
Regardless of what is ‘healthier,’ I find people are wanting to have more agency (also read: freedom) with their body and lifestyle. Even though science has helped us a lot, we place way too much validity in it and I commend those who seek alternate methods regarding health.
Bob, this is perfect! Thanks so much for writing this up – and I’m glad we’re still reading and commenting a year later!
I have perioral dermatitis, and both sodium lauryl sulfate and fluoride aggravate the condition – this is something I really NEED.
I’m with @Matt and @Krista on @Q’s comments – Krista you put it very eloquently and I for one appreciate that.
My two cents: there are books written and empirical evidence that fluoride is toxic. As for “pre-WWII conditions”? While I will agree there are some things that modern technology/science made better since then, I would like to point out that our globe was a lot less warmer, not to mention there was a lot less pollution in general. Television had yet to become prevalent – let alone any of it’s late 20th-century offshoots like video games and computers – drive-thrus had not yet been invented, and I believe people were just as likely to grow their own vegetables as they were to buy them at a market. Among other things. All equalling better health overall due to a better diet and more exercise.
There is evidence that wolves living in the wild have perfect dental health – they are not fed pet food you buy at the store, they have the whitest teeth you ever did see and ZERO cavities – and nobody’s brushing their teeth! God will provide, if only we will let him.
http://www.alt4animals.com/dental.htm
just a note but the life expectancy pre WW1 was about a third less than today. Does seem odd, more pollution, more harmful things about but we live much longer and (generally) healthier lives than our grandparents.
I could say a lot about this article. but heres a questopn for Rob in Madrid. Which do you prefer…live longer sicker? oor living shorter healthier?
Would you like to live 50 years with the health and fllexibility of a 20 year old? oooor 100 years with the health and flexibility of a 70 year old.
Its not just about Quantity of life but also about Quality of LIFE.
I”ll go the natural way and enjoy BOTH!
For more information on the bad effects of fluoride check out the research done in India and why they don’t want it over there.
As for why American companies don’t seem to mind so much. I like how my friend put it, “Funny how money makes things look better.”
I would like to know more about a lot more natural things that i can make bob
what are the processes involved in making toothpaste?
I used your toothpaste and my teeth got whiter!
if fluoride is so safe, why is it banned from being mixed in with the water supply in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Austria, France and The Netherlands?
Anything the government puts in the water sounds pretty suspicious to me, never mind all the data questioning the benefits of fluoride.
dis is a good project
Flouride has also been linked to bone cancer. Just an FYI.