Starches are widely utilized in foodstuffs as salad dressing, sauce, and processed foods. However, the functional properties of native starches are affected by processes such as heat treatment, acidity, and high shear stress. Starches can be modified chemically in order to have characteristics required by industries, but not to attribute the food a "natural and safe" label. Another option is to obtain native starches resistant to food processing stress conditions. The objective of this paper is the evaluation of commercial native organic starches under food processing stress conditions such as heat treatment and acidity. Suspensions of native functional organic starches (9460 and 9560, National Starch, and Chemical Industry) were prepared at 5% concentration (w/v), acidified with 1M citric acid, or autoclaved at 121 °C for 30 minutes. The results were evaluated by optical microscopy, flow curve, and viscoelastic aspects which were obtained by steady and oscillatory rheology. The acidity and heat treatment increased the starch gels structure that resisted to the processing stress conditions. The starch gels exhibited non-newtonian (pseudoplastic) and thixotropic behavior. Flow data were fitted to the Power Law or Herschel-Bukley models. All samples exhibited gel-like viscoelastic behavior which was preserved under several stress conditions.
starch; corn; waxy; functional; heat treatment; acidity
