Criticisms for the Cookie Diet

Like most successful diet programs, Cookie Diet has not been spared of negative criticisms. Most of these come from fellow doctors and nutritionists who question Dr. Siegal’s formulation and the amount of calories that a person under his program consumes in a day. They think that 800 calories a day is too low and not enough for an average person. Not only that, critics also think that the cookies in Dr. Siegal’s program are lacking in proper nutritional levels to give a person his/her daily requirements.

One critic, Amy Campbell is a nutrition and diabetes instructors at Boston’s Joslin Clinic. She said that the Cookie Diet is just another “fad diet” meant to lure and hook people with the idea that they can lose weight by just eating cookies during the day. She also said that while it has a strong appeal to weight losers, the whole program is not planned to be a nutritious plan at all because it is lacking in other important nutritional aspects like fruits, vegetables, vitamins, and fiber.

However, Dr. Siegal said that the safety of his patients is among his important concerns and that the program is well supplemented by vitamins. He emphasized that while diet pills contain harmful drugs, his cookies are formulated with amino acids from oats, rice, whole wheat, and bran—all meant to control hunger. He claims that his cookie mixture has been scientifically formulated and tested through the years by more than 500,000 patients, all of which were satisfied by the results.

Another claim by Campbell is the fact that the cookies lack fiber and two of the variants are very high in saturated fat, which raises the risk of heart disease.

To this, Dr. Siegal answered that patients are not expected to stay on with the Cookie Diet permanently for life. According to him, patients stay with the program depending on the amount of weight they intend to lose, and not for long. He also said that the faster the weight loss, the better it is for his patients, and that those who lose weight faster are the ones with clear weight loss goals in front of them.

Another critic, Connie Diekman of the Washington University in St. Louis said that Dr. Siegal’s very low calorie diet program is way below the minimum daily requirement to achieve a healthy weight loss pattern. According to her, Dr. Siegal’s program will promote weight loss, but will not change body fat, and this is not a healthy program.