Our study aims to develop a small handy low-cost viscometer for nursing care food management. There are many methods to measure the viscosity of a fluid. In this research, the rotational viscometer employing the observer-based method instead of the actual torque transducer has been developed. The digitally controlled motor has been used to estimate the viscosity in real time with high accuracy. In order to verify the effectiveness of the developed viscosity estimation method, a prototype viscometer has been constructed and tested the viscosity estimation accuracy with standard liquids. As a result, the viscosity accuracy is equivalent to that of the conventional torque transducer-equipped viscometer.