Rice Flour and Starch Functionality

Most rice is consumed as cooked milled rice, but a small portion is ground into flour or separated into a starch fraction and used to make food, pharmaceutical, and animal feed products. The foremost application for rice starch is as a carrier of pharmaceuticals. This discussion will focus on food-based applications for rice flour and starch. Many of the uses for rice flour and starch exist because rice is hypo-allergenic, gluten-free, bland in flavor, and in its native form exists with many different functional characteristics. Since milled rice consists of about 90% starch, the structure of this fraction and its physicochemical properties are the primary characteristics used to select rice varieties and rice starch for specific industrial applications. This chapter summarizes the current knowledge on the compositions of rice starch and structure of rice starch and its components: amylose and amylopectin. Recent advances made on the functionality of rice starch and modifications of starch to improve its functionality have been comprehensively updated.