An American doctor has developed biscuits that help people lose two to three kilos a week. The cookie diet has been medically proven and it's now all the rage with American celebrities and movie stars.

When it comes to losing weight, they say sweet treats like cakes and biscuits are the biggest no-no, but what if we told you, you could eat up to nine cookies a day, and actually drop the kilos?

It is called the Cookie Diet and it has now arrived in Australia. The cookies are made from secret ingredients and have been medically and scientifically proven to work for the past 36 years, with a combined total of 20 million kilos already lost by dieters overseas.

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It sounds like a gimmick - eating sweet biscuits to lose heaps of weight - but the proof is in the pudding for American obesity expert, Dr Sanford Siegal and his famous Cookie Diet.

“We determined a long time ago that the biggest detriment to losing weight was hunger. Hunger wrecks diets, and I felt that we would have much better success with our patients if we had a better method of controlling hunger,” Dr Siegal said.

To do that, the bariatric specialist came up with his own secret medical formula of ingredients, which he then turned into a tasty flavoured cookie. It has worked for half a million of his patients, and many more who now buy then online. Among them are celebrities like Jessica Simpson and Snookie from hit TV show Jersey Shore.

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“What's in the biscuit that makes it work is mixture of proteins. That's my formula. It's a combination of certain proteins that absolutely control hunger,” Dr Siegal said.

“What I look for is for someone to lose in the range of five to six kilos per month. Now that's rapid weight loss. However when that person gets on the scales on a regular basis, and sees the weight coming down, that bolsters their motivation and encourages them to go on with the diet,” he said.

“Most diets do not address the subject of hunger, and they become disinterested in it because first of all it's difficult, and secondly they don't see the results which bolsters their motivation.”

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Each cookie contains about 60 calories. The diet works like this: you take two cookies at breakfast, then one every two hours until lunchtime. At lunch you consume two cookies, then another at two hour intervals in the afternoon. For dinner there is a protein based meal of around 500 calories. Finally you take another cookie as an evening snack for a daily total of 1200 calories. Combine this with exercise and they say the kilos will melt away.

“If you eat 1000 to 1200 calories a day on a diet that's controlled by a food - our cookies - that control hunger, you absolutely will lose weight. The purpose of our cookie is to control hunger,” Dr Siegal said.

The cookies are now being made in Australia through OzHealth Pharma.

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Dieters Lisa Marie Farnhill and Leila Khouri say they have had spectacular results in the four weeks they’ve been eating them, as well as exercising.

“I have tried he shake diets and I didn't find they were fulfilling enough. I was still hungry after I had these shakes compared to these cookies. They really work, and they satisfy my hunger,” Farnhill said.

Farnhill has now lost just over 7.5 kilograms, eleven centimetres from her waistline, nine centimetres off her hips, and 0.5 centimetres from her arms.

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Khouri’s lost about the same amount of weight as Farnhill, fifteen centimetres from her waist, nine centimetres off her hips, and about eight centimetres from her arms.

Dr Siegal says there is nothing wrong in losing weight quickly as long as you follow proper medical advice.

“There are two things that are absolutely essential if we're going to have a successful weight loss program. One is we must control hunger, and the second we have to have a motivated individual who is participating in the process.”

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Dr Siegal’s son, Matthew, used the diet to lose twenty kilograms, and appear on a US reality TV show. He says the biggest killer of any diet is when dieters revert back to their old habits.

“If you go back to the same habits that caused you to be overweight in first place, you are going to be overweight again. But once you have lost weight, maintain the level of calories and exercise, then you'll keep the weight off,” Matthew said.

Matthew rejects the notion that the cookie diet is a fad diet.

“If this is a fad then it’s one of the longest lasting fads in history, because it has been around for 36 years,” he concluded.

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• Cookie Diet - www.ozhealthpharma.com.au