Electrochemical behavior of artificial antioxidant, butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), was investigated at a glassy carbon electrode modified with poly L-cysteine [poly (LCys/GCE)]. BHA exhibits a pair of well -defined redox peak on L-cysteine modified GCE with E pa =69 mV and E pc = 4 mV. The modified electrode showed good electrocatalytic activity towards the oxidation of BHA under optimal conditions and exhibited a linear response in the range from 1.0× 10 −5 to 1.0×10 −6 M with a correlation coefficient of 0.998. The limit of detection was found to be 4.1×10 −7 M. The kinetics parameters of the proposed sensor such as heterogeneous electron transfer rate, k s , and charge transfer coefficient, α, was calculated and found to be 1.20 s −1 and 0.575 respectively. The average surface concentration of BHA on the surface of poly (L-Cys/GCE) was calculated to be 3.18 × 10 −4 mol cm −2 . The analytical utility of the proposed sensor was evaluated by the successful determination of BHA in coconut oil and sesame oil samples.