Could we find a suitable method for assessment of average dietary intake?: In doubt between Scylla and Charybdis (a review)

For the sake of comparison of dietary surveys carried out in different countries, it is needed to find a common basic method for the dietary assessment. The suitable method should be relatively simple, easily practicable, inexpensive, suitable for the analysis of desired nutritional parameters in several target groups and comparable independently of the country where it is done. The paper gives a short review and appraisal of the most frequently used dietary assessment methods: 24-h dietary recall, dietary record, food frequency questionnaire and diet history. The background of useful evaluation seems as follows: the skill of interviewers, the common coding system of foodstuffs, the reliable conversion of food to nutrients (comprehensive food composition tables). On the basis of above mentioned criteria the repeated 24-h recall seems to be the first candidate for the common dietary assessment method.