Ingredient Information

Function

Modified Potato Starch is a starch extracted from potatoes. The cells of the root tubers of the potato plant contain starch grains (leucoplasts). To extract the starch, the potatoes are crushed; the starch grains are released from the destroyed cells. The starch is then washed out and dried to powder. Potato starch and potato starch derivatives are used in many recipes, for example in noodles, wine gums, cocktail nuts, potato chips, hot dog sausages, bakery cream and instant soups and sauces, in gluten-free recipes in kosher foods for Passover and in Asian cuisine. In pastry, e.g. sponge cake, it is used to keep the cake moist and give a soft texture. It is also occasionally used in the preparation of packaged grated cheese, to reduce sweating and binding.

Other Use and Industries

It is also used in technical applications as wallpaper adhesive, for textile finishing and textile sizing, in paper coating and sizing and as an adhesive in paper sacks and gummed tape. Potato starch was also used in one of the earlier color photography processes, the Lumière brothers' Autochrome Lumière, until the arrival of color film in the mid-1930s.

Health Effects

Modified potato starch is not known to have any adverse effects on health. It is considered to be safe for consumption. Marker gene found in modified potato gene is deemed to be safe. There was a ban on agriculture biotechnology in the European Union from 1998 to 2004. This ban on genetically modified potato starch and other genetically modified food was lifted by the EU in 2004. The marker gene called np2, found in modified potato starch, was declared as non- threatening to human health, animal heath and the environment by the European Food Safety Authority.

Origins

Thomas Kingsford is credited to have been the inventor of corn starch in the 1840s, while he was working as the superintendent of a wheat starch factory in Jersey City, New Jersey. Since their development in the 1940s, modified food starches have become a vital part of the food industry. Practically every category of food utilizes the functional properties of starch to impart some important aspect of the final product.