Different Starches
and Their Qualities
Cooks have several different forms of starch
to choose among for thickening sauces, each
with its own particular qualities. They fall
into two families: starches from grains,
including flour and cornstarch, and starches
from tubers and roots, including potato starch
and arrowroot. Less commonly seen except on
the ingredient labels of processed foods is
sago starch, from the stem pith of a Pacific
palm (Metroxylon sagu).
Grain Starches Starches from grains tend to
share several characteristics. Their starch
granules are medium-sized, and contain small
but significant amounts of lipids (fats, fatty
acids, phospholipids) and protein. These
impurities somehow give the starch granules
some structural stability, which means that it
takes a higher temperature to gelate them; and