Sago flour substitutes

The right answer, and close enough that the difference is hard to spot.

Best for

Sarawak laksa and sago noodles, kuih and steamed cakes, keropok and crackers, thickening sauces and puddings

Both are nearly pure starch with no protein and no flavour, both turn glossy and translucent when cooked, and both give that stretchy, chewy quality that Southeast Asian sweets depend on. Tapioca is marginally stickier and its gel is a touch softer, so noodles made with it are slightly less springy and a dodol will be a shade less firm. Tapioca flour and tapioca starch are the same product under two names, so do not worry about which the packet says. In a dodol or kuih recipe nobody will detect the swap.

A good thickener with one important limitation about heat.

Best for

thickening sauces and soups, gravies, crisp coatings for frying

Potato starch thickens faster and at a lower temperature than sago, and it produces a very clear, glossy sauce, which is often an advantage. The catch is that it breaks down if you hold it at a boil or keep it hot for long, so a sauce that looked right will go thin and watery after twenty minutes on the stove. Add it at the end, off the heat if possible, and do not reheat aggressively. In a chewy cake or noodle it gives much less bounce than sago, so it is a thickener substitute rather than a structure substitute.

The pantry option, fine for sauces and wrong for anything that needs chew.

Best for

thickening sauces, soups and custards, gravies, puddings

Cornstarch thickens more powerfully than sago, hence the smaller quantity, and it is genuinely reliable in a sauce that will be served straight away. What it will not do is bounce. Cornstarch sets into an opaque, slightly cloudy gel with a short, soft texture that breaks cleanly, so keropok made with it will not have the same snap and a chewy kuih will come out crumbly and pasty instead of elastic. It also thins if reheated, and it tastes faintly starchy if you undercook it.

The clearest gloss of any starch, with a couple of quirks to know about.

Best for

clear glazes and fruit sauces, acidic sauces, anything you plan to freeze

Arrowroot gives a beautifully transparent, shiny sauce and unlike cornstarch it holds up in acidic mixtures and survives freezing, so it is excellent over fruit. Two things to watch: it breaks down if you simmer it for more than a few minutes, so add it right at the end, and it turns unpleasantly slimy when combined with dairy. It gives almost no chew, so it is not a route to sago noodles or dodol, only to thickened liquids.

Excellent for chew, and useless as a thickener.

Best for

onde-onde and kuih, steamed cakes and dumplings, mochi-style sweets

Also sold as sweet rice flour or tepung pulut, this is the ingredient to reach for if the sago in your recipe was there for stretch and bounce rather than to thicken a liquid. It is considerably more elastic and denser than sago, so the result is chewier and heavier, and it can go gummy if you overdo it. It is not interchangeable in a sauce: it does not dissolve cleanly and will make a gravy lumpy and cloudy. Ordinary rice flour is a different product entirely and gives no chew at all.

The swap when your recipe wants sago pearls rather than sago flour.

Best for

sago gula melaka, sago pudding and bubur, coconut soups and desserts

Small white tapioca pearls look and eat almost exactly like sago pearls, which is why so much of what is sold as sago around the world is actually tapioca. They cook a little faster and release more starch, so the surrounding syrup or coconut milk goes cloudier and slightly thicker. Boil them in plenty of water until translucent with just a tiny white dot left in the middle, then rinse them under cold water to stop them gluing into a solid lump.