Just imagine that you are in the middle of a creamy soup, and to thicken the soup to your liking, you need to add 1 tablespoon of potato starch. What to do if you don’t have it under your hands? I will give you a few options with which you can replace the potato starch without running like crazy to the nearest local store.
Running out of potato starch or do you just look for other substitutes? Potato starch is a thickening agent so it is used often in the kitchen. In case if you will run out of potato starch, I covered the best options available so you can replace it with other ingredients and get a similar or even better final result.
Before we will go into the alternatives, let’s find what the potato starch actually is and how it helps your dishes to become more delicious.
What Is Potato Starch?
The potato starch itself contains minimum fat and proteins. In terms of taste, it is neutral and doesn’t have a specific flavor. Altogether, because of the properties that potato starch has, it is used as a thickening agent. It allows you to get your desire consistency for soups, stews, sauces, or gravy.
Another case for using potato starch is dough baking. It will offer moisture on the top. Potato starch will give the cake a glossy appearance.
Or you can use it as an additive. Processed meat, cheese, bakery items, etc. have short shelf lives. In order to extend the life span of these products, potato starch can be used as an additive.
How Is Extracted the Potato Starch?
Potatoes contain cells that contain starch grains, called leucoplasts. To extract the starch from the potatoes, we need to crush them to broke these cells and to release the starch grains. After that, the starch grains get washed and dried well until a powder will be formed.
It is also gluten-free. This is one of the reasons why it becomes recently so popular in cooking.
What It Is Used For?
Potato starch is used often in cooking or for baking. You can use it to thicken
It is also a gluten-free substitution for flour in bread recipes or muffins. Also, it is a great fit when you plan to fry the meat, vegetables, or fish.
A Few Tips for Working With Starch
- Don’t just dump the starch into the pan. Before adding the starch into the recipe, mix it in cold water in equal amounts. This will help avoiding forming lumps.
- If for you is important the texture quality, then go with arrowroot powder instead of flours. It will add thickeness to the dishes without adding any additional opacity.
- Don’t boil the liquid that contains starch, it will become slimy again.
- If you will use flour substitute, recheck the moisture level and adjust it acordingly.
- Potato starch and their alternatives are not the same exact thing. So, start small and gradually increase the amount. In that way, you will get the desired consistency.
- If you need a starch alternative for sweets such are cookies or pies, use sweet flours to enhance the taste.
What Are the Best Potato Starch Substitutes?
Cornstarch
Cornstarch is one of the most used Corn Starch Substitutes when we’re looking for a potato starch replacement. The corn starch is almost identical to the potato starch, so just replace the potato starch with the same quantity of corn starch.
Cornstarch will stop the gluten development and it also will help to get the coat a crunchy texture and it will absorb the moisture from the texture.
Use the same amount of corn starch as is requested of potato starch. Best to use for frying.
Psst… Cornstarch is one of the secret ingredients that will make your chicken fry a lot crispier.
Arrowroot Powder
Arrowroot powder or arrowroot flour is well known in the vegan world and gluten-free recipes. It is the most neutral starch between the entire list.
Also, make sure to not use the arrowroot with dairy-based meals because it will harm more than help.
Best to use it for the acidic liquids or foods that you plan to freeze.
The only downside of the arrowroot powder is that it is a bit expensive in comparison with other substitutes.
Wheat Flour
Another great alternative if you want to substitute the potato starch. Even if this flour is used for baking, you can use it also for frying and thickening the dishes.
Keep in mind that you should double the amount of wheat flour in comparison to potato starch if you will use it as a thickener. Also, wheat flour is not gluten-free.
Sweet Rice Flour
Rice flour is another gluten-free potato starch alternative that you can use for baking. If we will compare the sweet rice flour with the regular one, the sweet rice is richer in starch. So, it is better for your needs.
Also, it is finer and doesn’t add this gritty feeling when you will bake something.
A quick note: We recommend using it at the beginning of the cooking process. As for the amount, use 2 tablespoons of sweet rice flour for every cup of liquids.
Best to use into the dishes that you plan to freeze.
Tapioca Starch
If you look to add a little bit of sweet taste, this starch can be a good option. You can find it with a lot of alternative names such as cassava flour, mandioca, almidon de yuca, tapioca flour, yuca, aipim, or boba.
The difference between the tapioca starch and potato starch is that tapioca is lighter. As a result, you should increase the amount of tapioca starch.
Keep in mind that tapioca starch is not a good fit for acidic liquids. If you will combine those two, you will lose the ability to thickening.
It is best to use for pie fillings.
Coconut Flour
Another good replacement for potato starch is coconut flour. It has a sweet taste, so you will get a little different result if you will go with this option.
You can use coconut flour to thicken the cake’s creams.
Keep in mind that coconut flour has a different texture than potato starch. So, your final result will differ. Also, reduce for about 15% the amount of coconut flour in comparison to the potato starch.
Water Chestnut Flour
Chestnut flour will also work well for us. It has a sweet and light smoked flavor.
You can use it in many dishes that require potato starch. Also, it is gluten-free.
Almond flour
One of the most healthier substitutes for potato starch is almond flour. Almonds have a lot of vitamins and minerals.
This replacement is usually used more often in sweets because it has a nutty aroma and sweet flavor.
Quinoa Flour
Another rich in proteins, gluten-free substitute for potato starch. Keep in mind that quinoa flour has a distinctly bitter flavor.
Oat Flour
Great replacement especially if you plan to bake cakes or bread.
Sugar
If you need to add starch in the jams to make them thicker, but you don’t like the taste of the starch, you can add more sugar. Thus, when boiling, the jam will thicken.
Ground Flaxseeds
If you need to thicken the sauces, another potato starch substitute would be to use ground flaxseeds.
Double cream
If you are on a low-carb diet, and you prepare a lot of vegetable cream soups, you can thicken with double-cream.
Mochi Flour
Mochi flour is a glutinous rice flour that is used mostly in baking goods. It has a slightly sweet and milky flavor.
Use it in the same amount as the potato starch.
Hopefully, my article has helped you to find the best replacement that you needed to use in your recipe and you didn’t have to run to the store.
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