DESCRIPTION

Food Starch, Unmodified occurs as white or nearly white powders; as intact granules; and if pregelatinized, as flakes, powders, or coarse particles. Food starches are extracted from any of several grain or root crops, including corn (maize), sorghum, wheat, potato, tapioca, sago, and arrowroot and hybrids of these crops such as waxy maize and high-amylose maize, as well as pulses such as pea. They are chemically composed of one or a mixture of two glucose polysaccharides (amylose and amylopectin), the composition and relative proportions of which are characteristic of the plant source. Food starches are generally produced by extraction from the plant source using wet-milling processes in which the starch is liberated by grinding aqueous slurries of the raw material. The extracted starch may be subjected to other nonchemical treatments such as purification, extraction, physical treatments, dehydration, heating, and minor pH adjustment during further processing steps. Food starch may be pregelatinized by heat treatment in the presence of water or made cold-water swelling.