[Foodie]

Hi - I hope I'm in the right forum.

I was recently given a "mystery organic salt".  When added to highly refined starches (corn flour or rice flour - 80micron), the resultant compound gels dramatically when water is added to it.  There is an exothermic reaction.

A friend did ICP analysis on the "mystery organic salt" that showed that there is a Na content of13.0%mM and Al of 16mg/g (I wonder if the latter is not a contaminant?). pH 8.  I don't have access to a lab so have not done solubility studies or anything else. 

Assuming the sodium content is accurate, this would suggest the Molecular Weight‎ of the "mystery salt" is ‎around 176.8 g/mol.  The closest I can come to this is Sodium Octanoate, Molecular Weight 167.185924 g/mol.  The problem is the crystal structure of Sodium Octanoate does not look like the crystal structure of the "mystery organic salt".  (I having trouble uploading the image).

Is there a better way to approach determining the identity of the "mystery organic salt"?  I look forward to your feedback.

Foodie

[Corribus]

FTIR may tell you something useful.

FYI 167.2 MW is not very close to 176.8 MW.

[Foodie]

Thanks for the FTIR suggestion. 

[Babcock_Hall]

This is probably not relevant.  However, adenosine triphosphate and related compounds are known to latch onto aluminum ions.  ATP is too large to be your compound, but something like pyrophosphate not wholly unreasonable.