corn starch
Corn starch is corn with everything but the carbohydrate removed — the blandest fraction, prized in sensitive recipes and counted by the corn rules anyway.
Also appears on labels as: cornstarch · maize starch
What it is
Nearly pure starch washed from corn — no protein (and so effectively none of corn's allergenic content), no fiber, just gelatinizing carbohydrate. Veterinary dermatology diets actually favor it for that blankness.
Why it's in pet food
Expansion, binding, and hypoallergenic-adjacent energy: a corn-allergic pet reacts to corn PROTEINS, which starch barely carries — the reason prescription elimination diets can contain corn starch without contradiction.
How Bowlmark scores it
Scores are deterministic math over the printed label — the rules below apply to every product identically, and nothing estimates or fills in a blank.
Corn-worded, so both corn rules apply mechanically: splitting-base membership (≥3 in top 8 → −12) and the first-ingredient cheap-grain deduction if it leads a dry list. The nuance the engine can't see: as fractions go, starch is the defensible one — its common use in limited-ingredient diets is chemistry, not cost-cutting. Position and company decide which story a label is telling.
Foods that list corn starch
Ranked by score where scores exist. Placement here is never sold.
- Fancy Feast Medleys White Meat Chicken Florentine Paté With Cheese & Spinach79
- Hill's Science Diet Adult Savory Turkey Entrée79
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Chicken & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy73
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Tuna & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy73
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Turkey & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy73
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Whitefish & Cheddar Cheese Feast73
- Friskies Shreds Turkey & Cheese Dinner In Gravy73
- Hill's Science Diet Adult Indoor Ocean Fish Entrée73
Compare foods that list corn starch
Same species, same form, both scored — closest scores first, so the comparison is a real one.
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Chicken & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy vs Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Tuna & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Chicken & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy vs Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Turkey & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Chicken & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy vs Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Whitefish & Cheddar Cheese Feast
- Fancy Feast Delights With Cheddar Grilled Chicken & Cheddar Cheese Feast in Wet Cat Food Gravy vs Friskies Shreds Turkey & Cheese Dinner In Gravy
Sources
Related ingredients
Further reading
Cite this page
Bowlmark. "Corn starch in pet food — what it is and how it scores." https://www.bowlmark.com/ingredient/corn-starch
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- Last verified August 12, 2026
No stored score to stamp yet — the engine and config above are the ones a scan runs today.