Impact of Mineral Ions and Their Concentrations on Pasting and Gelation of Potato, Rice, and Maize Starches and Blends Thereof

Abstract

AbstractBlends of starches can undergo additive or non‐additive pasting and gelation. As the impact of this remains undocumented, the effect of (partial) cation removal from waxy rice starch (WRS), regular rice starch (RRS), waxy maize starch (WMS), regular maize starch (RMS), and blends thereof with regular potato starch (RPS) on their pasting and gelation is studied. This is done by prior extraction with water or a solution of singly protonated EDTA. The (partial) removal of cations lowers the gelatinization temperatures of individual starches, causes pasting to start at lower temperatures and the level of viscosity breakdown to increase. This indicates lower granular stability when removing cations. Blends of RPS with untreated WMS/RMS and WRS/RRS show more additive pasting than blends of RPS with the same starches from which cations have been partly removed. Additionally, the presence of cations in cereal starches reduces swelling and viscosity development of RPS. The high peak viscosities, breakdown, and setback values suggest that more granular breakdown results in higher availability of molecules for increased network formation in blends of RPS with treated starches than in those with untreated starches. The obtained results are of interest for food applications where different starches are combined.