The olefination of aldehydes with a Wittig reagent was accomplished by the following procedure: To a solution of methyl (triphenylphosphoranylidene)acetate (100 mg, 0.30 mmol, 0.8 equiv) in water (5 mL, 0.08 M) was added benzaldehyde (40 mg, 0.38 mmol). The reaction mixture was heated at 80 °C for 1h. The reaction was quenched by addition of brine and extracted with EtOAc. The organic and aqueous layers were separated, the organic layer was dried with Na 2 SO 4 , and the solvent was evaporated with a rotary evaporator to obtain the crude products, which were directly analyzed by 1 H-NMR spectroscopy.