What's the difference between corn starch and corn flour?are they the same?!
What's the difference between corn starch and corn flour?are they the same?
thanks!
Answers:
They aren't the same. I saw a recipe recently that used the term "corn flour or starch" which is totally wrong -- they will not do the same thing in a recipe.
Corn starch is a purified starch from corn which is used to thicken sauces and puddings. It also gives a light crumbly texture to baked goods when added to the flour.
Use only a small amount when thickening sauces. Mix about a tablespoon of cornstarch in cold water and add to simmering sauces to thicken. Add a little at a time, let it cook, and then add more to thicken more. It thickens with little or no taste, and is translucent. It is very common to thicken sauces in chinese cooking.
Corn flour is a flour product made from corn, sometimes called "Masa Harina." You can use it to make corn tortillas, and I have used a few tablespoons mixed with water as a thickener for chili. It is not translucent and has a lovely corn flavor and aroma.
Another product is cornmeal, which is a rougher grainy product, most often used in cornbread.
NO
NO
Check the dictionary
Cornstarch:
A dense, powdery "flour" obtained from the endosperm portion of the corn kernel. Cornstarch is most commonly used as a thickening agent for puddings, sauces, soups, etc. Because it tends to form lumps, cornstarch is generally mixed with a small amount of cold liquid to form a thin paste before being stirred into a hot mixture. Mixing it with a granular solid like granulated sugar will also help it disperse into a liquid. Sauces thickened with cornstarch will be clear, rather than opaque, as with flour-based sauces. However, they will thin if cooked too long or stirred too vigorously. Cornstarch is also used in combination with flour in many European cake and cookie recipes; it produces a finer-textured, more compact product than flour alone. In British recipes, cornstarch is referred to as cornflour.
Corn flour:
Finely ground cornmeal, corn flour comes in yellow and white and is used for breading and in combination with other flours in baked goods. Corn flour is milled from the whole kernel, while CORNSTARCH is obtained from the endosperm portion of the kernel. In British recipes the term "cornflour" is used synonymously with the U.S. word CORNSTARCH. MASA HARINA is a special corn flour that's the basic ingredient for corn tortillas.
No way.
Corn starch is a thickener. You add it to soups or gravy to make it thick. Add it to water and you have what is called a "flowing solid". It's wierd. You might have made it in second grade.
Corn flour is flour made from corn. You can make pancakes, cornbread, etc. It's like normal flour, but not.
In the UK they refer to Cornstarch is refered to as corn flour, the difference in a technical sence is one is the starch from the corn kernal and the other the ground meal and edosperm, Masa Harina is unsifted, corn flour is a sifted degermed flour.
I am a former chef, and for some dishes Masa is better, and you can get common cornflour at the bulk food or health food stores, it is good for baking when the germ and whole meal content is not needed.