the library

Cachaça

Spirits & brews· spirit

Every one of its 8 compounds carries a paper the library can cite.

• 2,3-butanedionearomaketonereads as strong odor (PubChem)Measured in 15 of 338 ingredients.cite

  Mean value of 4.3 mg/L, described as 'the ketone present in the highest concentration' of the compounds this panel targets; the paper reports column-distilled spirits carried higher concentrations of this compound than alembic-distilled ones. (The same section prints per-sample figures, e.g. 'samples L1 and L6, with 0.66 g L-1 and 0.53 g L-1', that are internally inconsistent with a beverage congener and with the paper's own stated legal-limit units elsewhere — evidence of a dropped micro- prefix in PDF text extraction; only the unambiguous mg/L mean above is landed.) — Leonardo Milani Avelar Rodrigues et al. 2020, Research, Society and Development (Section 3.4 (Analysis of 2,3-butanedione), targeted HPLC panel of 44 cachaça samples (column- and copper-alembic-distilled))
• 1-propanolaromaalcoholreads as burning taste (PubChem)Measured in 22 of 338 ingredients.cite

  8.97 mg/100 mL anhydrous alcohol in the unaged cachaça — Santos et al. 2025, Foods (Table 2, column 'Propyl Alcohol', row 'Control' (not aged))
• isobutanolaromaalcoholreads as sweet, musty odor (PubChem)Measured in 24 of 338 ingredients.cite

  5.62 mg/100 mL anhydrous alcohol in the unaged cachaça — Santos et al. 2025, Foods (Table 2, column 'Isobutyl Alcohol', row 'Control' (not aged))
• ethyl lactatearomaalcoholreads as buttery odor (PubChem)Measured in 9 of 338 ingredients.cite

  'Regardless of the type of wood used in the aging of the cachaça, there was a reduction during storage, starting with values around 36 mg/L and ending with values below 24 mg/L, except cachaças aged in chestnut barrels, which presented values close to 26 mg/L.' The paper attributes the decline partly to ethyl lactate transforming into ethyl acetate during ageing, and separately cites prior work associating high ethyl lactate with a buttery, rancid-butter character in distillates. — Julio Colivet et al. 2025, Food Science and Technology (Section 3.1 and Figure 1 (E, F), 48-month kinetic study of cachaça aged in amburana, oak, chestnut and balsam wood barrels, samples taken every 4 months)
• furfuralaromafuranreads as almond-like odor (PubChem)Measured in 33 of 338 ingredients.cite

  6.13 mg/L in the five-wood matured cachaça — Reitenbach et al. 2026, Molecules (Table 6, row 'Furfural')
• isoamyl alcoholaromaalcoholMeasured in 43 of 338 ingredients.cite

  9.31 mg/100 mL anhydrous alcohol in the unaged cachaça; the largest of the three named higher alcohols in that sample — Santos et al. 2025, Foods (Table 2 (Levels of alcohols and total higher alcohols in cachaças submitted to different treatments), column 'Isoamyl Alcohol', row 'Control' (not aged))