Starch was isolated according to the method of Wang et al.
(2011) with modifications as follows. The chestnuts (700 g) were
rinsed, peeled and homogenized in a kitchen blender with 1.5 L
distilled water for 1e2 min at maximum speed. The starch slurry
was passed through a 140 meshfiltrating cloth. The resulting starch
suspension was allowed to settle overnight at 4 C. The supernatant
was decanted, and the brownish grey layer on top of the white
starch sediment was removed. The starch pellet was dispersed in