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\ ˈstärch 
\
\starched; starching; starches
Definition of starch
(Entry 1 of 2)
: to stiffen with or as if with starch
starch
nounDefinition of starch (Entry 2 of 2)
1 : a white odorless tasteless granular or powdery complex carbohydrate (C6H10O5)x that is the chief storage form of carbohydrate in plants, is an important foodstuff, and is used also in adhesives and sizes, in laundering, and in pharmacy and medicine
2 : a stiff formal manner : formality
3 : resolute vigor
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Synonyms & Antonyms for starch
Synonyms: Noun
- beans,
- bounce,
- brio,
- dash,
- drive,
- dynamism,
- energy,
- esprit,
- gas,
- get-up-and-go,
- ginger,
- go,
- gusto,
- hardihood,
- juice,
- life,
- moxie,
- oomph,
- pep,
- punch,
- sap,
- snap,
- verve,
- vigor,
- vim,
- vinegar,
- vitality,
- zing,
- zip
Antonyms: Noun
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Examples of starch in a Sentence
Verb
He starches the collars of his shirts. Noun
a middle-aged woman who has retained the starch of youth
Recent Examples on the Web: Verb At times, the shirts’ high collars and starched feel felt ecclesiastical, while their voluminous sleeves almost angelic.
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San Diego Union-Tribune, "Valentino channels powerful simplicity in Paris show," 29 Sep. 2019 At times, the shirts’ high collars and starched feel felt ecclesiastical, while their voluminous sleeves almost angelic.
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Washington Post, "Valentino channels powerful simplicity in Paris show," 29 Sep. 2019 If there's white cotton curtains in the house, bleaching and starching them while ironing are efforts that go a long way.
6.
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Melissa Rolland, courant.com, "Projects That Don't Break The Bank," 19 June 2018 So to a certain extent, Apple has brilliantly taken advantage of the situation and starched their hat white.
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Recode Staff, Recode, "Full transcript: NYU professor Scott Galloway answers listener questions on Too Embarrassed to Ask," 26 May 2018 With hair combed neatly to one side, and dressed almost daily in suits that aren’t so much pressed as they are vigorously starched, Becerra is dutifully methodical when performing all the typical functions as California’s attorney general.
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Marcos Bretón, sacbee, "When Trump deports immigrants, California’s attorney general remembers his mom and dad," 11 Sep. 2017 Keri Anne Taylor-Melendez (Gilbert Melendez’s wife) just starched her opponent in her MMA debut. #
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Jon Becker, The Mercury News, "UFC fighter Melendez’s wife taking huge MMA step," 22 May 2017 His search for something else to use summoned memories of the gooey liquid his mother had used to starch the collars of his father’s shirts.
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Denise Gellene, New York Times, "Oliver Smithies, Tinkerer Who Transformed Genetics and Won a Nobel, Dies at 91," 11 Jan. 2017 Recent Examples on the Web: Noun In the event, each competitor fabricated and prepared two portions of a finished chicken, duck or Cornish game hen, along with a sauce, starch and a vegetable.
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cleveland, "Executive Director June Yost retiring from North Ridgeville Community Care: Short Takes on Avon, Avon Lake and North Ridgeville," 9 Nov. 2019 Because waxy potatoes are relatively low in starch and high in moisture, their cells stay intact when they’re cooked, meaning that slices or cubes hold up when boiled or baked.
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Sarah Jampel, Bon Appétit, "WTF Is a "Waxy" Potato?," 12 Sep. 2019 Now, broadly speaking, sugars and starches get broken down for energy usage and storage in our cells, tissues, and organs, per the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
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Carolyn L. Todd, SELF, "Here's What Carbs Actually Do in Your Body," 23 May 2019 All the while, leaves split water, harvest and manipulate solar energy, and stitch together hydrogen, oxygen and carbon to produce sugars and starches — the sources of virtually all food for Earth’s life.
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Quanta Magazine, "Forests Emerge as a Major Overlooked Climate Factor," 9 Oct. 2018 Might as well throw in a baked potato for top honors at B&B, an Idaho spud the size of a Nerf football, stuffed with fatty chopped beef in a tangy, peppery barbecue sauce loaded with cheese, bacon and sour cream for a starch-and-protein Hail Mary.
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Mike Sutter, ExpressNews.com, "Review: B&B Smokehouse sets a solid barbecue table on San Antonio’s South Side," 13 June 2019 For instance, brewing the Norwegian Woods farmhouse ale ($6.50) involved putting branches, fallen leaves, Eastern red cedar and spruce clippings into the mash tun (the chamber where grain starch is converted to sugars) before adding malts.
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Sameer Rao, baltimoresun.com, "How is beer made? 4 Baltimore area farm breweries find success in hops, not crops.," 6 Nov. 2019 Food exchanges: 3 starch, 2 vegetable, 3 lean meat, 1 fat.
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Darlene Zimmerman, Detroit Free Press, "Beef: Here's why it's leaner than ever and a source for several nutrients," 2 Nov. 2019 During the first two years of the experiment, the children were given little starch and half the average consumption of sugar in a typical Swedish diet.
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Sandee Lamotte, CNN, "The Swedish cavity experiments: How dentists rotted the teeth of kids with mental handicaps to study candy's effect," 30 Oct. 2019
See MoreThese example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'starch.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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More Definitions for starch
starch
verbEnglish Language Learners Definition of starch
(Entry 1 of 2)
: to make (clothing) stiff by using starch
starch
nounEnglish Language Learners Definition of starch (Entry 2 of 2)
: a substance that is found in certain foods (such as bread, rice, and potatoes)
: a powder or liquid that contains starch and is used to make clothing stiff
See the full definition for starch in the English Language Learners Dictionary
starch
noun\ ˈstärch \
\Kids Definition of starch
(Entry 1 of 2)
: a white odorless tasteless substance that is the chief form in which carbohydrates are stored in plants, is an important component of many foods (as rice and bread), and has various uses (as for stiffening clothes)
starch
verbstarched; starching
Kids Definition of starch (Entry 2 of 2)
: to stiffen with starch
starch
noun\ ˈstärch \
\Medical Definition of starch
: a white odorless tasteless granular or powdery complex carbohydrate (C6H10O5)x that is the chief storage form of carbohydrate in plants, is an important foodstuff, has demulcent and absorbent properties, and is used in pharmacy especially as a dusting powder and as a constituent of ointments and pastes
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Time Traveler for starch
The first known use of starch was in the 15th century
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