Ruth Winter.1978. A Consumer's Dictionary of Food Additives. Crown Publishers, Inc., New York.
Starch is stored by plants and is taken from grains of wheat, potatoes, rice, corn, beans, and many other vegetable foods. Insoluble in cold water or alcohol but soluble in boiling water. Comparatively resistant to naturally occurring enzymes and this is the reason processors "modify" starch to make it more digestible. Starch is modified with propylene oxide, succinic anhydride, 1-octenyl succinic anhydride, aluminum sulfate, or sodium hydroxide. Used internally as a gruel in diarrhea and externally to soothe skin rashes; used in dusting powder as a demulcent for irritated colon and an antidote for iodine poisoning. Modified starches are on the FDA list for further study for safety. GRAS ACCEPTABLE for packaging.
is a carbohydrate polymer made up of many units of glucose.
Igoe, Robert S. 1983. Dictionary of Food Ingredients. Van Nostrand and Reinhold Company.
is a carbohydrate consisting of glucose units containing amylose and amylopectin which contribute to varying starch properties. Starch is insoluble in cold water but upon heating, the starch granules swell and burst, forming starch paste. Starch sources include arrowroot, corn, potato, rice, sago, tapioca, waxy corn, and wheat. Starches are modified by treatment to alter their functional properties. Terminology designating these starches include: acid modified corn starch, food starch modified, modified food starch, oxidized corn starch, pregelatinized starch, thin boiling starch, and wheat starch, gelatinized.
Garrett, Theodore Francis (edited by). 1898. the Encyclopedia of Practical Cookery. L. Upcott Gill, 170, Strand, W.C. London. Vol. iv
is an organic substance occurring in rounded or oval grains in the cellular tissue of certain parts of plants. The seeds of the cerelia contain it in large quantities. Starches are such as arrowroot, barley, maize, potato, rice, rye, sago, tapioca, tous-les-mois, and wheat.
Excerpted from Montagne, Prosper. 1961. Larousee Gastronomique. The Encyclopedia of Food, Wine & Cookery. Crown Publishers, Inc., New York.
in former times, all solids deposited by juices obtained by extraction were called starches, though they differed widely from one to another.
Nowadays, the term is used especially of pure starch powder or the white powdery starch deposite which separates out from water in which certain pounded vegetables (such as potatoes, manioc, sago, rice, etc.) are washed.
Excerpts from Bender, Arnold E. 1990. Dictionary of Nutrition and Food Technology. Butterworths, Boston.
Complex polysaccharide composed of unit of glucose; consists of about one-quarter amylose and three-quarters amylopectin; the form in which carbohydrate is stored in the plant, and does not occur in animal tissue. (Glycogen is sometimes referred to as animal starch.) All starches are broken down by acid or enzymic hydrolyzis, or during digestion, first to maltose and then glucose, but the various starches such as potato, maize, cereal, arrowroot, sago, etc., have different structures. It is the principal carbohydrate of the diet and, hence, the major source of energy for man and animals.
Key Characteristics
Description
Solubility in Cold Water
Others
pH
Uses
Composition: polymer of glucose linked in the alpha 1,4 and beta 1,6 links
