Sucrose, a convenient test crystal for absolute structures

β-(2S,3S,4S,5R)-Fructofuranosyl-α-(1R,2R,3S,4S,5R)-glucopyranoside or sucrose, with formula C12H22O11 and crystallizing with two molecules per cell in the monoclinic space group P21, a = 10.8631 (9), b = 8.7044 (6), c = 7.7624 (7) Å, β = 102.938 (7)° at 300 (1) K, is readily available as a pure enantiomer. Its small cell volume, stability, purity, low thermal motion and the absence of its enantiomorph in a material available from grocery stores commend it as a test compound for experimental set-ups aimed at the determination of absolute structures. Practical details of recrystallization, crystal selection and mounting, experimental method as well as data processing are given together with lists of indices for Bijvoet differences sensitive to the hand of the molecule.