Experiments in Starch, Round 2
I tried two more variants this week, and had some surprising findings. This past weekend ppfuf gave me some wheat starch she'd had in the freezer, and cathyn dug out some barley he'd had around, so those are my subjects this time:
The wheat starch appeared and behaved almost exactly as the potato starch from my previous experiment had, so I won't cover that in too much detail, other than to mention that I boiled it using 3/4 cup wheat starch and 4 cups water, I ran my silk test strip through it once it cooled and hung it up to dry.
The barley acted similarly to rice, in that it stayed in discrete grains as I boiled it:
I used 1 cup of barley and 4 cups of water. I boiled it for about an hour, during which the barley completely absorbed the water and I added 2 more cups, so the final ratio of water to grains was about 6:1. Then I turned it off, covered it, and let it sit for 3 days.
Last night I strained the water out using the same strainer and silk I'd used before:
Then I ran my test strip through the starchy water and hung it up to dry.
After both the wheat starch and the barley starch strips were dry I ironed them and the results were thus:
Barley starch: Felt and looked just like the oat bran starch from the previous set. Pretty good, but not a heavy starch.
Wheat starch: Felt and looked just like the potato starch from the previous set. That interesting glassy, paper-like finish that felt just like wax paper.
What I learned is that the really stiff, glossy, waxy finish I got last time is NOT due to the potato part of the potato starch, it appears to be due to the fact that the starch was refined and concentrated, because I got the same result with the wheat starch, which came in the same form.
I then tried diluting the wheat starch (while cold - that apparently works fine, no boiling needed) with another cup of water to see if watering down the solution would result in a lighter starch, and indeed it does.
What this means is that I can make up a batch of the wheat starch that is good and thick (the texture is like gel or glue when it comes off the stove), run my silk through it and be assured that the result I'm getting is something that could have been achieved in the 16th Century with the grains they had available, because concentrating starch is a very simple process (which I may, or may not, attempt just to, you know, see) although I will admit right here and now that assuming that the 16th Century launderers had made this leap and figured out how to concentrate and/or refine starch is nothing I can document. I'm going to use the wheat starch though, because 1) I made it myself from materials available in the time and place the piece I'm making is from and 2) I love the result.
But, back to the barley. I never did find any reference in my searches to barley being used for starch in any capacity, historical or modern, so when I agreed to run it through my trials I was mostly doing so out of curiosity. It made an adequate starch, but then today when I got home from work I found a reason why it may not have been used at all. I had all the bowls of starch sitting on my counter and lo and behold:
It's already growing mold! After just a day (well, plus the 3 days it sat in the pan). None of the other starches I made molded at all, even after up to a week. So, I'm going to stick to my previous position that they probably wouldn't have bothered with using barley for starch - it can be put to so many better uses (*coughbeercough*) that the tendency to mold so quickly takes it out of the running for starch-making, in my book.
The wheat starch appeared and behaved almost exactly as the potato starch from my previous experiment had, so I won't cover that in too much detail, other than to mention that I boiled it using 3/4 cup wheat starch and 4 cups water, I ran my silk test strip through it once it cooled and hung it up to dry.
The barley acted similarly to rice, in that it stayed in discrete grains as I boiled it:
I used 1 cup of barley and 4 cups of water. I boiled it for about an hour, during which the barley completely absorbed the water and I added 2 more cups, so the final ratio of water to grains was about 6:1. Then I turned it off, covered it, and let it sit for 3 days.
Last night I strained the water out using the same strainer and silk I'd used before:
Then I ran my test strip through the starchy water and hung it up to dry.
After both the wheat starch and the barley starch strips were dry I ironed them and the results were thus:
Barley starch: Felt and looked just like the oat bran starch from the previous set. Pretty good, but not a heavy starch.
Wheat starch: Felt and looked just like the potato starch from the previous set. That interesting glassy, paper-like finish that felt just like wax paper.
What I learned is that the really stiff, glossy, waxy finish I got last time is NOT due to the potato part of the potato starch, it appears to be due to the fact that the starch was refined and concentrated, because I got the same result with the wheat starch, which came in the same form.
I then tried diluting the wheat starch (while cold - that apparently works fine, no boiling needed) with another cup of water to see if watering down the solution would result in a lighter starch, and indeed it does.
What this means is that I can make up a batch of the wheat starch that is good and thick (the texture is like gel or glue when it comes off the stove), run my silk through it and be assured that the result I'm getting is something that could have been achieved in the 16th Century with the grains they had available, because concentrating starch is a very simple process (which I may, or may not, attempt just to, you know, see) although I will admit right here and now that assuming that the 16th Century launderers had made this leap and figured out how to concentrate and/or refine starch is nothing I can document. I'm going to use the wheat starch though, because 1) I made it myself from materials available in the time and place the piece I'm making is from and 2) I love the result.
But, back to the barley. I never did find any reference in my searches to barley being used for starch in any capacity, historical or modern, so when I agreed to run it through my trials I was mostly doing so out of curiosity. It made an adequate starch, but then today when I got home from work I found a reason why it may not have been used at all. I had all the bowls of starch sitting on my counter and lo and behold:
It's already growing mold! After just a day (well, plus the 3 days it sat in the pan). None of the other starches I made molded at all, even after up to a week. So, I'm going to stick to my previous position that they probably wouldn't have bothered with using barley for starch - it can be put to so many better uses (*coughbeercough*) that the tendency to mold so quickly takes it out of the running for starch-making, in my book.