The present invention provides a standardized method and a kit for an accurate quantification of HAV in clinical and food samples. The general approach is based on the use of several controls to measure the efficiency of those critical steps of the quantification: the nucleic acids extraction and the RT-PCR reactions. The kit comprises: a Mengo virus mutant strain with the same growth properties than those of the wild-type Mengo virus and with no pathogenic capacity; a single stranded RNA molecule corresponding to a fragment of the HAV genome; primers that specifically bind to regions of the 5′ non coding region of the HAV genome; a detectable labeled probe that specifically binds to the amplimer resulting from the RT-PCR; and an appropriate molecule to generate an standard curve for the quantification of HAV.