Production of tapioca

What's "TAPIOCA"
Tapioca is essentially a flavourless starchy ingredient, or fecula, produced from treated and dried cassava (manioc) root and used in cooking. It is similar to sago and is commonly used to make a milky pudding similar to rice pudding. Purchased tapioca comprises many small white spheres each about 2 mm in diameter (although larger grain sizes are available). These are not seeds, but rather reconstituted processed root. The processing concept is akin to the way that wheat is turned into pasta. These tapioca pearls are made mostly of tapioca starch, which comes from the tapioca, or bitter-cassava plant. In other parts of the world, the bitter-cassava plant may be called "mandioca", "aipim", "macaxeira", "manioca", "boba", or "yuca".

Cassava is native to South America. The balls are prepared by boiling for 25 minutes, until they are cooked thoroughly but have not lost pliancy, then cooled for 25 minutes. The pearls have little taste, and are usually combined with other ingredients, savory or sweet.

Tapioca is a word derived from the Tupi language of Brazil (from tipi'óka). [1] This refers to the process through which cassava (Manihot esculenta) is made edible. It should be noted, however, that as the word moved out of South America it came to refer to similar preparations made with other esculents: 'Tapioca' in Britain often refers to a rice pudding thickened with arrowroot, while in Asia the sap of the Sago palm is often part of its preparation.

Processing and production factors
Separation of starch granules from the tuber in as pure a form as possible is essential in the manufacture of cassava flour. The granules are locked in cells together with all the other constituents of the cytoplasm (proteins, soluble carbohydrates, fats and so on), which can only be removed by a purification process in the watery phase. Processing the starch can therefore be divided into the following stages:

• Preparation and extraction. Crushing of the cells and separation of the granules from other insoluble matter (i.e. adhering dirt and cell-wall material), including the preparatory operations of washing and peeling the roots, rasping them and straining the pulp with the addition of water.
• Purification. Substitution of pure water for the aqueous solution surrounding the starch granules in the mash obtained in the first stage, as well as the operations of sedimentation and the washing of the starch in tanks and on flour tables, silting, centrifuging, etc.
• Removal of water by centrifuging and drying.
• Finishing, grinding, bolting and other finishing operations.

This method of processing is essential in the preparation of any kind of starch. For cassava, however, because of the relatively small amount of secondary substances, the separation at each stage is performed with great ease. Whereas with maize and other cereals the grinding of the seed and the mechanical separation of the germ and the pericarp from the grain present special problems in stage 1, and the separation of protein and other constituents in stage 2 can only be accomplished with the aid of chemicals, these operations can be reduced to a minimum in cassava preparation. It is indeed possible to obtain a first-rate flour from the cassava root without special equipment by using only pure water. This makes the processing of cassava flour particularly suitable for rural industries.

Example of cassava starch manufacturing process