This invention provides stable aqueous compositions including stable coating compositions, and methods of their production. The stable aqueous compositions and stable aqueous coating compositions comprise i) an aqueous dispersion of one or more emulsion-polymerized addition polymer comprising polymerized units of one or more carboxylester monomer, wherein at least one carboxylester monomer is a vinyl ester monomer; ii) one or more carboxylesterase enzyme; iii) one or more mono-alcohol with a formula molecular weight of less than 76; iv) optionally, acetaldehyde; and v) optionally, one or more organic carboxylester with a normal boiling point of less than 150° C.; and wherein the aqueous composition has a headspace volatile organic compound (VOC) content, as measured by headspace gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) at 33° C., characterized by a content of less than 10 ppm of acetaldehyde, and less than 10 ppm of the one or more organic carboxylester, and more than 50 ppm of the one or more mono-alcohol. Preferably, the ester hydrolysis activity in the composition is less than 0.010 micromole/minute.