The perchlorate concentrations in various Korean food samples were monitored, and 663 samples belonging to 39 kinds of food were analyzed. The analysis results revealed that dairy products contain the highest average concentration of 6.34 mu g/kg and high detection frequency of over 85%. Fruit and vegetables showed the next highest perchlorate concentration with an average of 6.17 mu g/kg. Especially, with its average concentration of 39.9 mu g/kg, spinach showed the highest perchlorate level among all target food samples studied. Tomato was followed by spinach, which showed a high perchlorate average concentration of 19.8 mu g/kg, and over 7 mu g/kg was detected in ham and sausage (avg. 7.31 mu g/kg) and in instant noodles (avg. 7.58 mu g/kg). Less than 2 mu g/kg was detected in fishes, meats and beverages. The exposure dose of perchlorate in Korean by food intake was calculated on the basis of the analyzed perchlorate levels in this study. The daily perchlorate dose to which Korean adults are exposed is 0.04 mu g/kg bw/day, which is lower than the RID (0.7 mu g/kg bw/day) value suggested by US NAS. This result indicates that Korean people's current exposure to perchlorate from domestic food consumption is evaluated as safe. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.