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Compound sheet

Aroma molecule

3-methylbutanoate

Smells offruity, ester, sweet, apple

Found in 3 ingredients. We hold no measured concentration for it in any of them yet, so we cannot say where it is strong enough to smell.

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Formula
—
Mass
101.12 g/mol
CAS
623-42-7
PubChem
—
FEMA
3500 · GRAS · verify
Threshold · water
48.0 ppb
Class
—
Status
Key food odorant

01How little it takes

  • in water 48
  • in air 3.58

ppb, log scale · tick = median of published values, bar = full range

02Where it turns up

  • Fruit1
  • Meat & fish1
  • Drinks1

of the 3 ingredients that contain it, by food group

03What it travels with

Too few ingredients to say what it travels with.

What does 3-methylbutanoate smell like?

Sources describe it as fruity, ester, sweet, apple. The key-food-odorant survey gives fruity, apple.

It is a key food odorant (individualist): identified in the meta-analysis of 227 food samples as one of 151 individualist odorants, which appear in under 5% of foods and carry the signature of specific ingredients. Source: Dunkel et al. 2014, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 53, 7124–7143

How this molecule is described

  • chemical FlavorDB 2.0, Flavordb Odor Column 2 sources agree
  • solvent FlavorDB 2.0, Flavordb Odor Column 2 sources agree
  • pine FlavorDB 2.0, Flavordb Odor Column 2 sources agree
  • fruity, ester, sweet, apple shown above Llm Adjudicated

Ordered by how many independent descriptor streams give each wording, then by how often it appears. The bar is replication (one source copied onto many ingredients scores high), not corroboration.

Which foods contain 3-methylbutanoate?

We list 3 ingredients that contain it, but presence is not the same as smell. What matters is how much is there compared with how little it takes to notice it. That ratio is the odour activity value (OAV): above 1, you can smell it.

Found in

Measured foods first, then real food profiles, then thin or composite records (marked). The figure beside each is how many compounds that ingredient has in total, not the amount of 3-methylbutanoate in it. ✓n = sources that recorded the link.

Measured concentrations

FoodConcentration (ppb)OAVSource
whisky 123.0 2.56 Corpus paper

OAV = measured concentration ÷ odour threshold (48.0 ppb, the engine’s working value — see the 4 published values). OAV ≥ 1 = perceptible. Concentrations from open-access papers; a row whose food is not one of the ingredients above is listed here but not placed on the ruler.

How strong is 3-methylbutanoate?

Orthonasal, in clean water: 28.0 ppb to 68.0 ppb, median 48.0 ppb, from 2 published values.

Published thresholds

4 measured values from the literature, grouped by what was measured: a threshold smelled in clean water, tasted, or measured in a real food are different quantities and are not pooled.

Orthonasal, in clean water · 28.0 ppb–68.0 ppb ppbThe reference measurement — smelled in water. OAV is computed against this.
ThresholdMatrixSourcePaper
28.0 ppb SIDA water Rychlik 1998 · 3 studies —
68.0 ppb water_odor Leffingwell —
In air · 0.056 ppb–7.1 ppb ppbAirborne detection — not comparable to a water threshold.
ThresholdMatrixSourcePaper
0.056 ppb air (food: reference standard (air)) Literature corpus 33995294, 34718544, 37515910
7.1 ppb air Nagata 2003 —

Only values we can attribute are listed. Where a compendium’s licence does not permit public attribution its figures are omitted, so every number here traces to a citable source.

Is 3-methylbutanoate safe to eat?

A substance matching this name is listed by FEMA as generally recognized as safe (GRAS) for use as a flavoring: FEMA number 3500, published in GRAS 10. Check current FDA and EFSA guidance for your market and use level.

FEMA number
3500 ? partial match
Publication
GRAS 10
FEMA name
HEXYL 3-METHYLBUTANOATE

Use-level matrix not extracted for this substance; check the source publication for current ppm guidance.

Source: FEMA GRAS publications 1–33.

3-methylbutanoate questions

What does 3-methylbutanoate smell like?

Sources describe 3-methylbutanoate as fruity, ester, sweet and apple. It is one of the key food odorants identified by Dunkel et al. (2014).

Which foods contain 3-methylbutanoate?

We list 3 ingredients that contain 3-methylbutanoate.

How strong is 3-methylbutanoate?

The median of 2 published odour thresholds in water is 48.0 ppb (range 28.0 to 68.0 ppb).

Look up another compound — search by name, CAS number, PubChem CID, or FEMA #.

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Cite this analysis
Plain text
Compound Kitchen (2026). 3-methylbutanoate compound data sheet. https://compkitchen.com/compound/3-methylbutanoate. Accessed 2026-11-03.
BibTeX
@misc{compkitchen_compound_3_methylbutanoate_compound_data_sheet_2026,
  title  = {3-methylbutanoate compound data sheet},
  author = {{Compound Kitchen}},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://compkitchen.com/compound/3-methylbutanoate},
  note   = {Accessed: 2026-11-03}
}

Methodology DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19719459 · CC BY 4.0 · Citations are a request, not a requirement.