2,3-butanedione

130 µg

“Diacetyl, like butter, or butter popcorn”

Beer flavour standard used to train professional beer tasters to recognize and scale the intensity of diacetyl character. 2,3-Butanedione is an off-flavour formed in beer either from the activities of brewer's yeast or contaminant lactic acid bacteria.

Food grade | free from sensory impurities | extensively tested | safe to smell and taste.

  • Label image
  • Chemical structure

Flavour cards

Flavour standard information

Technical specification

Assessment
Without covering the glass, swirl the beer to release the aroma. Take a single short sniff. Repeat as necessary.
Amount of flavour per capsule
130 µg
Threshold
10 – 40 µg / l in beer
Origins
Produced in beer from a precursor formed by yeast during fermentation. Can also be formed by contaminant lactic acid bacteria.
Confusions
  • Butyric acid
  • Vanillin
  • Isobutyraldehyde
Importance
Desirable flavour in some ales, stouts and lagers, eg Pilsner. Off-flavour in other lager beers. Considerable efforts are made by breweries to tightly control this flavour character.
CAS registry number
431-03-8
Other names
  • diacetyl
  • biacetyl
  • 2,3-butane dione
  • butane-2,3-dione
  • 2,3-diketobutane
  • dimethyl diketone
  • dimethyl glyoxal
  • 2,3-dioxobutane
Remarks
2,3-Butanedione is one of two vicinal diketones found in beer. The ratio of diacetyl to pentanedione concentrations can be used as an indicator of bacterial contamination in beer.
Threshold distribution
Graph
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