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[Clansgian AT wmconnect.com]

> >I believe the items were flour, pasta, and similar.  What was the reason 
> behind it?
> Thanks
> 

When you add starch to thicken something (flour, corn starch, arrowroot, etc) 
or when you boil pasta in water, it will thicken up a little from the starch 
dissolving in the water.  The water will not get above 212 degrees (or there 
about depending on altitude). 

BUT when you can the food, that dissolved starch gets much, much hotter and 
so it gelatinizes and forms a different substance altogether.

This by the by, is what happens to popcorn.  The hard hull makes a kind of 
mini-pressure cooker and the steam in the kernal causes the starch to 
gelatinize. When the kernal blows, that molten gelatin instantly cools and 
forms the 
fluffy popcorn.

Gelatin formed from starch is good food, you just don't need a clogged up jar 
of it in you canned food.

James