3-n-Butylphthalide
Also written butylphthalide, phthalides, sedanenolide, celery phthalides
Quick answer
The compound that makes celery taste of celery — and the reason lovage, celery seed and celeriac all taste of the same thing without being the same plant.
What it does
Phthalides are the defining aroma class of the celery group and 3-n-butylphthalide is the principal one. The character is unmistakable and hard to describe in other terms: green, slightly medicinal, faintly soapy, and savoury in a way that reads as depth rather than as flavour. It is the reason a stock tastes finished, and the reason commercial bouillon is sometimes said to taste of lovage — both are leaning on the same compound. In concentration it becomes almost bitter, which is why celery seed is used by the pinch and lovage by the leaf rather than the handful.
How it behaves when cooked
Four properties of the molecule, and what they mean at the stove.
- Volatility
- moderate
- Fat solubility
- high
- Water solubility
- low
- Heat stability
- moderate
Moderately volatile and fat-soluble, which is why celery flavour survives a long stock and intensifies as the liquid reduces rather than cooking away — and why a celery-seed dressing tastes stronger than the quantity suggests, since oil carries it. The practical consequence for a cook is the one the substitution records keep making: celery seed is many times more concentrated than the vegetable or the leaf, because the compound is concentrated into a tiny seed rather than diluted through a watery stalk. A teaspoon of celery seed in place of a handful of lovage is a common and unrecoverable mistake.
Spices that carry it
Recorded on the compound rather than on each spice, so the two cannot disagree.
- Celery seedPrincipal component
Concentrated into a seed, which is why celery seed is measured by the pinch where the vegetable is measured by the stick.
- LovagePrincipal component
The reason lovage tastes so strongly of celery despite being a different genus, and the reason it is used by the leaf rather than the bunch.
Not to be confused with
Compounds a reader is likely to take for this one, and why they differ.
Apiole and dillapiole
The other phthalide-adjacent aromatics of the carrot family, in parsley and dill respectively. They are structurally related and read quite differently, which is why parsley and lovage are not substitutes for one another despite the family resemblance.
Questions this page answers
- why do lovage and celery taste the same
- what makes celery taste of celery
- what is butylphthalide
- why does celery seed taste so strong
- what are phthalides