2. Cook two tablespoons of rice in two-thirds of a cup of boiling, salted water✪ Boiled Rice for five minutes. Finish cook- ing in a double boiler. (Why is less water used ?) 3. Cook two tablespoons of rice in two-thirds of a cup of boiling, salted water for five minutes. Then place in a mold and steam. In all cases cook until the rice is soft. a. Compare the time used to cook by the different methods. b. Compare the appearance of the kernels as a result of the different treatments. c. Note also the relative amounts of rice before and after cooking. STARCH Starch occurs in the cells of all plants as tiny white granules, but the size, shape, and appearance of these differ with the kind of plant from which they are taken. A plant manufactures sugar from the carbon dioxide in the air and from water, and this sugar is used as nutriment for the plant, being dissolved in the juice or sap and circulating through it. But since the plant has to store some of this nutriment for future use, it manufactures starch from some of the sugar. Starch has the advantage over sugar that 58 FOOD STUDY it is not soluble in water. The material is carried into the cell as a solution of sugar which can pass readily through the cell wall and is then turned into granules of starch. When the starch is finally used as the plant food, this process is reversed, the granules change into sugar again, and can then pass out through the cell wall. Scientists do not agree entirely in regard to the construc- tion of starch granules, but they believe that they are made up of at least two kinds of starch which are some- times named red and blue amylose. Amylose is merely the scientific name for starch, and the names red and blue are given to the two kinds not at all because of their color, for they are both white, but because of the colors which they turn with iodine. The starch inside the granules and composing the greater part of the grains is blue amylose, easily digested. Its outer covering is red amylose, much more difficult of digestion and impervious to cold liquids. If the starch grain is heated in water, it begins to swell, till its outer covering is stretched thin and allows liquids to pass readily through it. In this form digestive juices can get at the starch inside to digest it; and, therefore, cooked starch is more digestible than raw. Starch granules found in potato and arrowroot seem to be made up of only these two kinds of starch, but those in cereals seem to contain a small amount of a third kind called rose amylose. This is more difficult of digestion than is either of the other kinds, but with long boiling can be made to change into blue amylose. As it seems to be rather hard to cook the starch granules when they are shut up in the cell walls of the seed, this may be the reason why cereals take such a long time to cook. Corn starch is, of course, a cereal starch, and ordinary wheat flour, too, contains an abundance of starch; but in grinding the grains, the cell walls are broken and so there is not the Rice Starch Wheat Starch STARCH GRAINS, MAGNIFIED MANY TIMES From Leach's "Food Inspection and Analysis." STARCH 59

AI-modernized reading of the original text

2. Cook two tablespoons of rice in two-thirds of a cup of boiling, salted water for five minutes. Finish cooking in a double boiler. (Why is less water used ?) 3. Cook two tablespoons of rice in two-thirds of a cup of boiling, salted water for five minutes. Then place in a mold and steam. In all cases cook until the rice is soft. a. Compare the time used to cook by the different methods. b. Compare the appearance of the kernels as a result of the different treatments. c. Note also the relative amounts of rice before and after cooking. Starch occurs in the cells of all plants as tiny white granules, but the size, shape, and appearance of these differ with the kind of plant from which they are taken. A plant manufactures sugar from the carbon dioxide in the air and from water, and this sugar is used as nutriment for the plant, being dissolved in the juice or sap and circulating through it. But since the plant has to store some of this nutriment for future use, it manufactures starch from some of the sugar. Starch has the advantage over sugar that it is not soluble in water. The material is carried into the cell as a solution of sugar which can pass readily through the cell wall and is then turned into granules of starch. When the starch is finally used as the plant food, this process is reversed, the granules change into sugar again, and can then pass out through the cell wall. Scientists do not agree entirely in regard to the construction of starch granules, but they believe that they are made up of at least two kinds of starch which are sometimes named red and blue amylose. Amylose is merely the scientific name for starch, and the names red and blue are given to the two kinds not at all because of their color, for they are both white, but because of the colors which they turn with iodine. The starch inside the granules and composing the greater part of the grains is blue amylose, easily digested. Its outer covering is red amylose, much more difficult of digestion and impervious to cold liquids. If the starch grain is heated in water, it begins to swell, till its outer covering is stretched thin and allows liquids to pass readily through it. In this form digestive juices can get at the starch inside to digest it; and, therefore, cooked starch is more digestible than raw. Starch granules found in potato and arrowroot seem to be made up of only these two kinds of starch, but those in cereals seem to contain a small amount of a third kind called rose amylose. This is more difficult of digestion than is either of the other kinds, but with long boiling can be made to change into blue amylose. As it seems to be rather hard to cook the starch granules when they are shut up in the cell walls of the seed, this may be the reason why cereals take such a long time to cook. Corn starch is, of course, a cereal starch, and ordinary wheat flour, too, contains an abundance of starch; but in grinding the grains, the cell walls are broken and so there is not the Rice Starch Wheat Starch STARCH GRAINS, MAGNIFIED MANY TIMES From Leach's "Food Inspection and Analysis."

Records on this page

Boiled Rice

Food study