What's the Best Pie Filling Thickener? (2024)

FAQs

What's the Best Pie Filling Thickener? ›

Cornstarch as Pie Filling Thickener

Very often flour or cornstarch is used, but in certain instances tapioca, arrowroot and potato starch can also help achieve the desired consistency.

Which one you use is a matter of personal preference. Cornstarch makes for a shiny, glossy filling. A little goes a long way because it has twice the gelling power of flour. Flour thickens nicely but leaves more of a matte finish.

Cornstarch. Cornstarch is the most common thickening agent used in the industry. It is mixed with water or juice and boiled to make fillings and to give a glossy semi-clear finish to products.

Experiment with different thickeners

If you usually use flour to thicken your apple pie and it's not doing the job, try something different: cornstarch, tapioca, and arrowroot are other established fruit pie thickeners. For more on specific thickeners and how to use them, see our Pie Filling Thickeners Guide.

Potato Starch

As an amazing thickening and binding agent, it is ever popular in many gluten-free recipes. With a low gelatinizing temperature, relatively colorless, odorless, and tasteless, and a strong binding texture, potato starch is used for cooking and baking applications alike.

There are plenty of situations that require the thickening power of a pantry starch: your pie filling, soup, sauce, gravy. Cornstarch, tapioca starch (also known as tapioca flour), arrowroot, potato starch and plain old wheat flour are typical options.

No, when canning pie filling, there is no substitute for Clear Jel®. Other thickeners like cornstarch clump when canning and may interfere with heat being able to reach throughout the jar. Without heat penetrating throughout the jar, yeast, mold, or other harmful bacteria can form.

Freezing causes liquids thickened with flour or cornstarch to shear or separate during freezing. Therefore, baked pies or fillings thickened with tapioca or modified food starch such as Instant ClearJel® or ThermFlo® will maintain their consistency better.

What to do before using thickener? ›

Allow hot drinks to cool slightly before adding the thickener. Thickened drinks stay on the tongue for longer so they may taste stronger. You may need to make drinks slightly weaker than usual. Stirring the powder with a spoon causes lumps.

The three main ingredients you can use to thicken a soup are flour, cornstarch, and xantham gum.

Some pie recipes thicken the filling with flour; others use cornstarch, while others still rely on tapioca.

Stir a tablespoon of cornstarch into 2 tablespoons of cold water and add it to your filling mixture to thicken it.

The three most common starches used to thicken the fruit juices of a pie are flour, tapioca, and cornstarch. I prefer cornstarch because I find that it actually enhances the flavor of the fruit.

All-purpose flour is an easy substitute for cornstarch; in fact you may see recipes for thickening pie fillings or soups with either. You'll need 2 tablespoons of flour for every 1 tablespoon of cornstarch in a recipe.