DIMETHYL SULFIDE AND ITS PRECURSOR IN SWEET CORN

Raw corn contained essentially no dimethyl sulfide (Me2S). The average Me2S content in canned or heated sweet corn samples was 8.7 p.p.m. Since the flavor threshold of this compound is in the neighborhood of a few parts per billion, Me2S is undoubtedly one of the more important flavor constituents of heated corn. Heating in excess of the normal canning treatment or in excess of 5 minutes of autoclaving did not result in further production of appreciable quantities of Me2S. S-Methyl-methionine sulfonium salt, a heat-labile compound which decomposes to yield homoserine and Me2S, was isolated from unheated sweet corn. © 1968, American Chemical Society. All rights reserved.