benzofuran

caramel furan

Found in 5 ingredients across the CompKitchen flavor graph.

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

2D Lewis Structure

Formula: C8H6O
Molecular weight: 118.13 g/mol
PubChem CID: 9223 — full record on PubChem

Properties

Odor threshold — in a food matrix: 23.7 ppb – 35.0 ppb median 29.4 ppb · 2 published values · see all 2 with sources
Volatility: high
CAS number: 271-89-6

Regulatory · United States

FEMA GRAS — Generally Recognized As Safe for flavoring use

? Partial match

FEMA number: 4315
GRAS publication: GRAS 23
FEMA primary name: 3,6-Dimethyl-2,3,3a,4,5,7a-hexahydrobenzofuran

Reported use levels (ppm by food category)

Typical vs maximum reported addition levels in finished food. Use as a regulatory ceiling reference — verify against the current GRAS publication for your product category.

Food category	Typical (ppm)	Maximum (ppm)
baked goods	100	500
cheese	25	125
condiments/ relishes	25	125
fats/oils	50	250
gravies	50	250
imitation dairy	50	250
meat products	25	125
poultry	25	125
processed vegetables	25	125
reconstituted vegetables	25	125
seasonings/ flavors	500	5000
snack foods	50	250
soups	25	125

Source: FEMA GRAS publications 1-33. 4 related FEMA records for this name — verify the exact substance for regulatory use.

Published thresholds

2 measured values from the literature. Grouped by what was actually measured — a threshold smelled in clean water, tasted in the mouth, or measured in a real food are three different quantities and are not pooled.

In a food matrix

23.7 ppb – 35.0 ppb

Measured in a real food, where the matrix shifts detection — not a clean-water value.

Threshold	Matrix	Source	Paper
23.7 ppb	water (food: cheese)	Literature corpus	38280925
35.0 ppb	water (food: unknown)	Literature corpus	30884723, 33618705, 38658602 +1

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

Where you'd actually smell it

Odor Activity Value = measured concentration ÷ odor threshold (29.372 ppb, the engine's canonical value — see the 2 published values). OAV ≥ 1 = perceptible.

Food	Concentration (ppb)	OAV	Source
cheese	3.0	0.10	—

Concentrations from PubMed Central Open Access papers (free literature corpus, MIT-style licensed). Copper = OAV ≥ 10 (strongly perceptible). Green = OAV ≥ 1 (perceptible).

Found in

Measured impact first, then profile share

Every ingredient known to contain benzofuran. Ingredients with a measured concentration come first, ranked by odour activity; the rest follow by how large a share of that ingredient's profile this molecule is. The figure beside each is how many different compounds that ingredient has in total — not the concentration of benzofuran in it. Full concentrations are in the OAV table above.

344 cmpds

507 cmpds

564 cmpds

586 cmpds