Stock is the basic element of cuisine. Stock is the tasty essence extracted by means of boiling plants or meats in water. Dried bonito stock and kelp stock in Japan, Tan in China, Bouillon (Soup stock) in Europe are representative of stocks. The materials used for making stocks differ from place to place.
  In Japan, since Edo era dried bonito has been used as the raw material to make soup stock. The result of the sensory test showed that the Japanese preferred dried bonito stock but accepted chicken bouillon, whereas the Chinese preferred the chicken bouillon, but did not accept dried bonito stock. The Japanese and Chinese showed a contrast attitude towards bonito stock. As the result of Principal Component Analysis, the Japanese chicken bouillon and the Japanese dried bonito stock are positioned quite close to each other and the Chinese chicken bouillon is positioned at a distant position. After the Discriminant Analysis, the taste components and odor of the three stocks could be distinguished from each other. It is inductive to conclude that the Japanese taste and odor of chicken soups differ from that of the Chinese. This fact reflects the difference in dietary life and preferences. Moreover, the results of the investigation suggested that pre -weaning flavor experience of the dried bonito stock- flavored diet enhanced the mice’s preference for dried bonito stock.
  Dried bonito stock has long been used as medicine among the people. As the result of investigation, we found that the mechanism of antihypertensive action involves not only ACE-inhibitory activity, but also other mechanism, as the direct action on vascular smooth muscles. Dried bonito stock has the effect on controlling obesity and fatigue.

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  Decreased independence, autonomy and activities of daily living are linked to requirements for nursing care and admission to care facilities, regardless of age. The present longitudinal study used the Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA) to investigate the nutritional status of elderly people and provide data for maintaining or preventing a decrease in quality of life. Subjects comprised a total of 257 day- or short-term residents of W Nursing Home surveyed in March 2009 (n=89), May 2010 (n=84) and May 2011 (n=84). The MNA is composed of 18 items : 6 screening items, A-F, and 12 evaluation items, G-R, and involves evaluation based on the graded results of interviews and physical measurements. Subjects were divided into groups I-VII based on total scores. Groups I-III were classified as having favorable nutritional status, groups IV-VI as being at risk of undernutrition and group VII as having poor nutritional status. Interviews and measurements were conducted for all assessment items and question items were analyzed after being grouped into dietary, physical and lifestyle aspects.
  The 84 subjects included in the third survey were classified as group I, n=39 (46. 4%); group II, n=6 (7. 1%); group III, n=5 (6. 0%); group IV, n=17 (20. 2%); group V, n=13 (15. 5%); Group VI, n=3 (3. 6%); and Group VII, n=1 (1. 2%).
  Of the 20 subjects followed for the entire study period, MNA scores increased, were maintained and decreased for 12 (60. 0%), 3 (15. 0%) and 5 (25. 0%) subjects, respectively.
  Reasons for score increases included relief from psychological stress or acute illness and increased body mass index (BMI), while causes for score decreases included BMI, the administration of 3 or more types of medication per day, number of meals, protein intake, and liquid intake (non-alcoholic drinks such as water, milk and juice).
  While there was an annual turnover in subjects, 61. 9% of subjects participated in all three surveys and there was an increase in repeat day- and short-term residents over the study period. This may have been due to increased use by those requiring care or increased numbers on admission waiting-lists.
  Factors including psychological stress and acute disease should not be overlooked for the continued health management of elderly people. Dietary habits represent the primary cause of changes in BMI but care is also required regarding psychological factors that decrease appetite. The MNA requires only a short completion time and can be administered by anyone involved with elderly people, and nutritional care and management implemented at the stage of risk of undernutrition may be useful for care prevention.
  Lifestyle support should be further promoted in order to facilitate elderly people′s ability to continue living at home while using nursing homes on a daily or short-term basis.

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  We investigated the effects of corn oil and perilla oil intake by rats during pregnancy and lactation on the fatty acids composition of plasma and brain of rat pups. Two groups of dams were fed either a corn oil diet (CD) or a perilla oil diet (PD) during their pregnancy and lactation. On days 8, 21 and 33 after birth, two pups each from the litters of all dams were killed and their blood and brain samples were collected. After weaning, the 46 and 60-d-old pups were dissected. On day 8 after birth, although the n-3 fatty acid in the plasma of the PD group was 3 times higher than that of the CD group, no significant difference in the brain was observed between the two groups. On day 1 after birth, no brain n-3 fatty acid composition in the pups from both groups was detected, but they increased with the pup′s growth. The n-6/n-3 in pup′s brain of dams fed the CD and the PD was 1. 88 and 1. 74 on the day 8 after birth, and 1. 26 and 0. 93 on the day 60 after birth, respectively. Therefore, it was suggested that the fatty acid composition of the brain in pups remained constant while the dams were fed different oils during pregnancy and lactation.

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[in Japanese]

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  A survey about the preference, intake situation and consciousness of beans was conducted on female students. Regarding the taste of beans, the number of persons who especially or somewhat like beans was almost the same while the number of persons who dislike beans was less than 10% overall. The highest ingestion frequency of beans was about once a week while a 2-3 times ingestion per week followed. More kinds of beans were eaten by persons who like beans. The well-known beans were soybean, peanut, azuki bean, broad bean, pea and kidney bean. Whereas the ingestion frequency of soybean and azuki bean was higher, that of broad bean and kidney bean was lower. Bean dishes and bean products, which are often eaten occurred in the order of simmered dish, natto and Japanese sweets. The simmered dish of beans was the best one, often handmade at home, and the commercial product was purchased at a high rate. It is assumed that the person who likes beans cooks beans dishes at home more frequently and the preference of beans is influenced by the comprehension of bean dishes at home. Although almost all persons recognized that beans include much protein, the number of person who recognized that dietary fiber was rich in beans was less than half.

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  Date displays on food products, from the progress in processing techniques and international standards, have together caused a change in the “production data” to time limit indicators such as “use-by date” or “best-before date”. This paper focuses on the number of food poisoning outbreaks and food imports, particularly the import of milk and other dairy products, and analyzed the change in food waste after changes in the display on food products. Consumers were given questionnaires about the effects on them of the “use-by date” or “best before date” especially effecting the on decreasing food waste by the consumers. The main points of the study are as follows:
  (1) The number of food poisoning outbreaks increased after the change in the display on the food products. Moreover, the total amount of food waste from consumers calculated as waste energy increased after the change in the display on the food products.
  (2) A number of consumers prefer food products with “production data”.
  (3) A number of consumers want to calculate the eatable period of food products. If information, which enables consumers to calculate the eatable periods is provided, it may reduce the amount of food waste.
  (4) Information such as the inspection contents, safety factors, a one-third rule in addition to the “production date” helps consumers reduce food waste. If such information is provided, we estimated that the amount of food waste will decrease by about 1-2.72million tons.

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  The present study aimed to investigate inter- and intraobserver error in order to clarify whether mastication time and frequency can be accurately measured using video observation.
  Mastication time and frequency were measured from video camera footage of four subjects. Interobserver error was calculated based on differences in measurement values between two observers′ single observations of the four subjects and analyzed using intraclass correlation coefficient. Intraobserver error was calculated based on differences in measurement values from one observer′s observations of the four subjects repeated three times and analyzed using one-way analysis of variance and intraclass correlation coefficient.
  Intraclass correlation coefficient was ≥0. 9 for both inter- and intraobserver measurements of mastication time and frequency, demonstrating small inter- and intraobserver error. No significant differences in mean values were observed for intraobserver error with one-way analysis of variance.
  The present findings indicate that inter- and intraobserver differences in measurement values for mastication time and frequency based on video observation are small, suggesting that one measurement by one observer is likely to provide representative values for mastication time and frequency during video observation.

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