Sta-Flo is a concentrated liquid starch made by Dial Corporation; I think it's been around for a long time. You dilute it with water (one part Sta-Flo to two parts water) in a household spray bottle (a pump-type plant mister, for example). I've seen it at King Soopers and Safeway. It's sold in both a one-quart ($1.99) and two-quart ($3.99) bottle; the two-quart bottle is equivalent to seven 22-ounce cans of spray starch. Sometimes you can get the aerosol cans on sale for $1 each. If you always buy spray starch on sale, you would still save $3 for seven cans' worth of starch. If you don't, you can save quite a bit more. Other benefits:
* Less waste in both production and disposal
* Convenience of having a quantity of starch on hand while occupying less space than lots of cans
* You can adjust the amount of starch based on how you like it. If you want a heavier starch, dilute it less. A lighter starch, dilute it more.
* You can also use starch for certain craft applications.
I also just prefer using a pump bottle over an aerosol can. And it sure is nice to not keep throwing cans away, never to be used again. I think, really, the most appealing thing to me is I can mix my own starch as I like it, whenever and however I want, with less expense. Now that I think of it, I imagine I could find a recipe somewhere for really homemade starch (women used to do it for generations, I'm sure!); the first three ingredients of Sta-Flo (and there aren't many) are water, cornstarch, and Borax. But for now, this is easy and inexpensive and it works well for us.
If you try it yourself, let me know what you think! And if you do happen to have a recipe, I'd love that too. :)
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