Abstract
In this study, dietitians working in the school foodservice industry in the Chungbuk region were surveyed to determine their perception of medicinal herbs and medicinal foods in order to obtain basic data for developing medicinal food menus. The findings of this study are as follows. Many of the dietitians had low confidence in medicinal herbs used in medicinal foods. However the more the subjects ate such food, the higher their perception was. The higher the perception and reliability were, the more positive the answer was in terms of taste, nutrition and efficacy. Regarding the familiarity with medicinal herbs, the subjects, regardless of their age, showed a high perception of easily accessible medicinal herbs; younger subjects preferred Schisandrae fructus, Rubi fructus and Acanthopanacis cortex. The higher the perception and the eating frequency were, the higher the familiarity was. Regarding the development of medicinal food menus, the older the subjects were, the more positive they viewed the development of menus. Also, dietitians with 15 years of experience showed a high interest in the development of new menus.