Starch

a fine, white, granular powder found in nearly all plants. It is composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, having very nearly the composition of sugar, into which, in fact, starch is readily converted. Starch is to the vegetable kingdom what milk is to the animal kingdom. It is the natural food of young plants. Many plants store up immense quantities of it in root-stocks, seeds, and fruit, in order that it may be drawn upon for next season's growth. Beans contain over ninety-five per cent of starch; oats from thirty to forty; Indian corn about sixty-five; and dried potatoes about twenty per cent. Wheat flour is rather more than half starch.

The process of preparing starch is very simple. A pared potato may be grated up fine and stirred well in water. If the milky liquid thus obtained be drained off and allowed to settle, a deposit of starch will be found at the bottom. By pouring off the water and drying the deposit in an oven, a small quantity of commercial starch may be obtained. This is the method employed in the large starch factories, except that the grating is done by a mill. Settling takes place in huge vats and the product is dried in trays, heated usually by steam pipes. The starch is then shoveled into sacks like flour for shipment. Such starch is worth from two to four cents a pound at the factory. It is used quite extensively in sizing calico and in thickening the colors and mordants used in cotton mills.

There were, in 1905, 131 starch factories located in seventeen states. The output for that year was valued at $8,000,000. Indiana, New York, and Ohio lead in this industry. Perhaps the most noted establishment is the Kingsford factory located at Oswego, New York.

Tapioca and sago, used for puddings and soups, are starches obtained from the roots of the cassava and the stem of the sago palm respectively. The corn starch of the table is obtained by crushing and washing corn. The best starch for laundry purposes is made from rice. It is interesting in this connection to learn that in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, cuffs and ruffs were not infrequently starched yellow, and that at one time the Puritans preferred to starch their linen blue.

It is of interest to know that during the growing season every green leaf is a starch factory. The materials required are carbon and water. The water is absorbed usually by the roots of the plant and ascends by way of ducts. The carbon is obtained from the air in the form of carbon dioxide, a combination of one atom of carbon with two of oxygen. All natural air contains more or less of this starch-forming material. The air enters the leaf through small door-ways, usually in the under surface, that open in growing weather. The union of carbon and water is brought about by the green coloring matter in the leaf cells, and light. The starch is stored chiefly in the seeds and tubers as described above. Starch growing robs the soil of no fertility. The farmer who sells starch or starchy foods is not impoverishing his fields.

The granules of starch formed by different plants differ in appearance. Under a microscope a granule of wheat starch appears circular. Those of corn starch are smaller and appear somewhat six-sided. Those of the parsnip are exceedingly minute. Starch granules are wrapped in stout cellulose walls or cells containing from two to two hundred starch molecules. When heated these cells, as in the case of tapioca, burst open like popcorn.

See Iodine; Sugar; Brewing; Malt; Seeds; Tapioca; Sago