Starch Through Thick and Thin

The Greeks knew who discovered how to separate starch for cooking--they did. Or to be more specific, the people of the Greek island of Khios, off the coast of present-day Turkey. That formula was followed with scarcely any change throughout the Middle Ages: Cover whole wheat with water for a week and a half, changing it regularly, and when it has softened, crush it, strain it and dry the starch for later use.

What impressed the Greeks about starch was that it didn’t need grinding the way flour does; the Greek word for it is “ amylon ,” which literally means “not milled.” They probably thought of starch as a sort of pudding, because a related word, “ amylos ,” means wheat slowly simmered until the hulls soften. ( Amylos may sound like a simple-minded dish, but it was honored in the Middle Ages under the name frumenty, and clear into the 19th century frumenty was a regular side dish at European banquets.)

The Romans had a more modern attitude toward starch. They used amulum for thickening sauces, as medieval European cooks continued to do. Cooks have also thickened pie fillings with starch since the Renaissance.

In the Middle East, there was a quite different approach. The Persians had devised a way of separating starch from flour, rather than from whole wheat. You kneaded dough, then kneaded it again under water until the starch washed out and there was nothing left but the chewy gluten, which you threw away. Middle Eastern cooks used the starch either in this liquid form ( malban ) or dried ( nishasta: literally, “what settles”). They valued it for making puddings and sweetmeats similar to Turkish delight.

The Chinese now prefer New World sources of starch such as corn, manioc and arrowroot for thickening sauces, but earlier they probably used wheat starch made by the Persian method. They know all about kneading dough under water, only they don’t throw away the gluten. They call it mianjin (“the muscles of the wheat”) and make vegetarian “pork” and “chicken” products out of it. We’ve picked up on mianjin in this country too; if you ever see the words “textured vegetable protein” on a food label, that’s what it is.