A cookie diet is a calorie restricted fad diet designed to produce

weight loss Weight loss, in the context of medicine, health, or physical fitness, refers to a reduction of the total body mass, by a mean loss of fluid, body fat (adipose tissue), or lean mass (namely bone mineral deposits, muscle, tendon, and other conn ...

, based on

meal replacement A meal replacement is a drink, bar, soup, etc. intended as a substitute for a solid food, usually with controlled quantities of calories and nutrients. Some drinks come in powdered form or pre-mixed Health shake, health shakes that can be cheaper ...

in the form of a specially formulated

cookie A cookie is a baked or cooked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, n ...

. In 1975, while researching a book on the effect of

natural food Natural food and all-natural food are terms in food labeling and marketing with several definitions, often implying foods that are not manufactured by processing. In some countries like the United Kingdom, the term "natural" is defined and regu ...

substances on hunger,

South Florida South Florida is the southernmost region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is one of Florida's three most commonly referred to directional regions; the other two are Central Florida and North Florida. South Florida is the southernmost part of th ...

physician Sanford Siegal developed a mixture of certain

amino acids Amino acids are organic compounds that contain both amino and carboxylic acid functional groups. Although hundreds of amino acids exist in nature, by far the most important are the alpha-amino acids, which comprise proteins. Only 22 alpha am ...

and baked them into a cookie intended to control his patients' hunger. He instructed his patients to consume six cookies (approximately 500 calories) during the day to control hunger, and a dinner of approximately 300 calories in the evening. From 2002 to mid-2006, Siegal licensed U.S. Medical Care Holdings LLC to open

franchise Franchise may refer to: Business and law * Franchising, a business method that involves licensing of trademarks and methods of doing business to franchisees * Franchise, a privilege to operate a type of business such as a cable television p ...

d weight loss centers. The company opened centers in the United States and Canada under various names including Siegal Smart for Life Weight Management Centers. The relationship between Siegal and his former franchise ended in August 2006. Siegal no longer supplies his products or licenses his name and weight loss system to USMCH. On September 25, 2008, USMCH filed for

Chapter 11 Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code (Title 11 of the United States Code) permits reorganization under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. Such reorganization, known as Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is available to every business, wheth ...

bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor ...

protection. Cookie diets include the Smart for Life Cookie Diet, Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet, Hollywood Cookie Diet and R&D Diet Cookie. All require 4 to 6 cookies per day, sometimes in addition to other food, such as one meal of six ounces of meat in the case of the Siegal diet.

Criticism

The cookie diet has been labelled a

fad diet A fad diet is a diet that becomes popular for a short time, similar to fads in fashion, without being a standard dietary recommendation, and often making unreasonable claims for fast weight loss or health improvements. There is no single defini ...

. The diet is unbalanced and its requirement of 800 calories a day has been described as too low."The Cookie Diet"
ABC News. Retrieved December 16, 2019.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cookie Diet Diets Fad diets