[Sca-cooks] Starch in cooking

[Terry Decker]

I wouldn't use spray starch or powdered laundry starch due to the additives. 
Almost all green plants produce starch and commercial starch is extracted 
from grains, potatoes and various rhizomes.  To my knowledge, all starches 
consist primarily of amylose and amylopectin in a mix of 20-25%/80-75% 
respectively and a varying group of trace chemicals.  Amylopectin is the 
primary active ingredient and the general similarity of all starches means 
they are generally interchangeable in recipes.

Tapioca flour is almost pure starch extracted from cassava root.  It also 
shows up as Brazilian arrowroot.  While the recipe you are working with 
almost certainly used either wheat or rice starch, an equal amount of 
tapioca flour should produce the same result.

Corn flour is often used in England to denote grain starch (often amydon), 
while corn starch is American English for starch from maize.

Bear


I am still not getting it. When I go to the supermarket, what can I buy as 
an equivalent of starch or can I just spray on the starch from my laundry 
room? - Don’t like the latter as forefathers didn’t have spray cans in the 
Middle Ages. . . The supermarket catalogue does not list starch/amidon. I 
see that maizena is cornstarch but I assume that is from corn on the cob 
which did not exist in 13th century Spain? I see I have Tapioca flour but 
that is not starch - no?

> Terry Decker wrote:
>
> The endosperm of any grain consists primarily of starch which can be
> extracted with water.  The earliest reference to the practice in Europe is
> in Pliny's Natural Histories.  Recipes that call for amydon are calling 
> for
> wheat starch.  In regards the Anonymous Andalusian cookbook, the starch 
> will
> likely be either wheat starch or rice starch.
>
> In practice, your spray starch might actually work, but let me recommend
> that you use something a little more ordinary.  Since the primary
> differences in extracted starches are in the trace chemicals, to test the
> recipe you could use wheat starch, rice starch, corn (maize) starch, 
> potato
> starch, tapioca (cassava) flour, or arrowroot powder.
>
> Bear
>
> On Nov 13, 2016 10:25 AM, "Susan Lord" <lordhunt at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> The Anon Al-Andalus recipe 469, translated by Perry/Friedman as an
>> "Eastern Sweet" calls for starch. What does that mean in layman terms? 
>> All
>> I can think of are ridiculous items like a throw in a potato or spray it
>> with my starch can used when ironing. . .
>

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