Moulavi who also specialized in weight loss. Moulavi wanted to go into business with Siegal. "This fellow was charismatic," Siegal says. "A good talker. He made grandiose promises."

Dr. Moulavi, 45, is now based in Boca Raton, where he heads a company called Smart for Life. He chuckles at Siegal's characterization of him, suggesting that Siegal might not be the sweet bespectacled man in the white lab coat that he looks like on his cookie packages.

Both parties concur that in 2002 they signed an agreement that would allow Moulavi to open franchises based on the Siegal model. It gave Moulavi the exclusive right to open weight-loss centers outside of Miami-Dade, Broward, Collier, and Monroe counties.

Soon enough, Siegal began receiving checks. According to Siegal, each independent franchise paid Moulavi tenpercent of its take; the two doctors split that. Siegal maintained the longtime ritual that he continues today: Once a week, he'd go to his private bakery in a Miami warehouse accompanied only by his wife. "I lock us in," Siegal says. "When there's no one around, I mix my potion." He leaves batches of it for his team of bakers to mix into the cookies.

Siegal's recipe — referred to in press releases as a "proprietary combination of grains and other natural ingredients" or "a hunger-controlling amino acid protein formula" — is so secret, he says, that even his son Matthew, who serves as president and CEO of his company, does not know the formula. It's locked up in a safe deposit box that his son will have