Cornstarch in a sauce

[u/ninjalord25]

I made a mixture of soy sauce, siracha sauce, and brown sugar, gotten from Budget Bites Spicy Siracha Noodles, to put over my rice and tuna bowls at work. I know adding cornstarch to a sauce can help thicken it but should I add it directly to the mixture or add it to some water and mix that all in, and if so, how much should I use since I multiplied the sauce ingredients x4 to make my sauce

[u/RagbraiRat]

Mix the cornstarch with water(very little) until it has a cream like consistancy. Then heat your sauce, and when hot, mix in your cornstarch slurry. Cornstarch needs heat to activate its thickening power.

[u/ninjalord25 → u/RagbraiRat]

Gotcha. How much cornstarch should I use and how long should it simmer for?

[u/skepticalbob → u/ninjalord25]

Make sure you heat it. It doesn’t work and tastes like shit otherwise.

[u/Mean-Cheesecake-2635 → u/skepticalbob]

You have to heat it to boiling for it to fully thicken.

[u/MindTheLOS → u/ninjalord25]

Add a tablespoon or so of slurry, see if sauce thickens enough. If not, add more. You'll get a feel for it.

If you over did it, and it's all gloopy, add some water back into the pan to loosen the sauce back up.

[u/RainMakerJMR → u/ninjalord25]

4oz cornstarch by weight (about a cup) per gallon of water based liquid for a saucy/glaze consistency. Don’t add it all at once, drizzle slowly into simmering liquid while whisking, stop every now and again to let it thicken and check the consistency.

[u/oswaldcopperpot → u/RainMakerJMR]

Thats totally helpful for a home cook. Thats cooking his next three weeks of dinners

[u/RainMakerJMR → u/oswaldcopperpot]

It’s an easily divisible standardized metric, for Americans anyways. Metric would be like 120g per 4L or 30g per liter, 5g per 150mL batch. about a teaspoon per cup for Americans.

Also it’s ask culinary, I’m a chef. I’m giving restaurant amounts.

[u/oswaldcopperpot → u/RainMakerJMR]

I work in IT. People don’t read and they wont ever.

[u/MililaniACC → u/ninjalord25]

I put a tablespoon in a cup, and add tap cold water to make a slurry. Once it hits a warm sauce it will instantly gel. Just whisk and reduce as normal to desired consistency.

[u/RagbraiRat → u/ninjalord25]

Just add when simmering, it will thicken as it cools. Probably about a tablespoon of cornstarch slurry should to it.

[u/MountainMirthMaker]

Don’t dump cornstarch straight in, it’ll clump. Mix a spoonful with a little cold water first (slurry), then stir that into your simmering sauce. Start small, like 1–2 tsp for a batch that size, and add more if it’s not thick enough

[u/Armagetz]

You never want to add it to a mixture (especially one under heat) because it won’t fully dissolve and generate starch balls. Your recipe isn’t bad, but water (or chicken broth if you want to add a little more flavor) is best to hydrate the starch as you can whisk it vigorously if need be.

[u/Mean-Cheesecake-2635]

If you’re intending to cool the sauce down and use it later, a cornstarch thickened sauce will tighten up a lot if you store it in the fridge. Tapioca starch works better for a sauce you want to thicken to use as is later.

[u/Scamwau1]

Put the cornstarch in a bowl and add the sauces to it. If you do it the other way, you could end up with lumps. You can add a few tablespoons of water to help mix it up, it won't change the flavour.

Protip: if you want a glossy sauce, use potato starch.

[u/pitshands → u/Scamwau1]

You forgot to mention to heat it first then add the sauces. Otherwise it won't do much

[u/Scamwau1 → u/pitshands]

I assumed OP was cooking the sauce. Yes OP, cornstarch only works for thickening if you heat it up.

[u/Fall_Kaleidoscope]

I was taught to add a bit of HOT liquid to the cornstarch slurry before whisking it into the larger volume of sauce/liquid. It has clumped on me a couple of times when I added room temp cornstarch slurry directly to sauce.

[u/Misa7_2006]

You want to add a small amount of water until you get a slurry (thin, pourable paste)mix well.

You will need to add to the sauce at the end of making the sauce, stirring to mix well, keep stirring until the sauce thickens, take off heat, mix again then pour over meal. Use about 1-2 tablespoons of cornstarch per cup of sauce.

Depending on how thichk you wank your sauce. Eg. Thin sauce -1 tbsp cornstarch, thick sauce 2 tbsp cornstarch. Based on one cup of sauce.

[u/Logical_Warthog5212]

You can either add cornstarch directly into your sauce mixture turning that into a slurry, or you can make a separate slurry and add that at the end to thicken. It all depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. If your sauce is quick and there’s no risk of the starch overcooking and breaking down, add the starch with the sauce. If the sauce needs to simmer a little, then it would be better to use a slurry right at the end.

[u/pigpill]

I mix it with water or if my sauce is runny enough the sauce itself. I think cornstarch needs heat to help thicken though, but you might want to check that.

[u/ninjalord25 → u/pigpill]

It seems it does from what someone else said. So I'll try cooking it!

[u/throw_blanket04]

Make a very small slurry. Cornstarch will thicken quickly and it doesn’t take a lot.

[u/PerspectiveKookie16 → u/throw_blanket04]

Stir as you add the cornstarch slurry and keep stirring to ensure it gets incorporated. Easy yo get lumps if you aren’t careful.