At the Court of Chancery Courthouse in Georgetown, Del., it started Thanksgiving week. One person brought in a couple dozen M&M cookies. A law clerk baked apple cake. Still another employee brought in cranberry bread.

"Everybody likes to share —it just makes you feel good to bring in the treats for everybody," said Mary Ellen Greenly, secretary to the chief judge. "It brings us all together instead of being competitors."

This is the season for food indulgence, and not just at home. Workplaces will be piled high with chocolates, pies, cookies, nuts, popcorn and other delights brought in by employees or donated by customers and clients. The holiday season seems to bring out the baker in American workers.

But this food fest coincides with an increasing emphasis on employee wellness as healthcare costs have skyrocketed. Some large companies that offer health benefits have programs to help employees manage diabetes, hypertension and high cholesterol, according to the 2006 health benefits survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Twenty-eight percent of big companies have programs for weight loss, according to the survey.

Still, managers are reluctant to become food police, nutritionists and workplace experts said. One reason is that the creamy, nut-covered cheese log serves as a kind of social glue in the office. Humans have an innate desire to break bread together, said Meryl Gardner, an associate professor of marketing at the University of Delaware.

"When we eat together, we are somehow making peace," said Gardner, who has studied the nexus between food and emotion. "We're suspicious of people who won't eat with us."

Instead of outlawing caramel-coated popcorn and chocolate-covered pretzels, self-regulation is the key, dietitians said. Workers who want to partake of the office plenty need to fit what they eat in the workplace in the context of what else they consume all day, said Sue Snider, professor of food sciences at the University of Delaware. An occasional chocolate at the office is not going to ruin the waistline.

It's widely believed that between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day, people pack on five to 10 pounds. But the average weight gain is actually one pound during the holiday season, according to a 2000 study by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.

The downside is that extra pound isn't lost during the year, the study found. An annual gain of one pound could lead to obesity. Even worse, overweight people in the study were more likely to gain five pounds or more during the holidays.

The goodies in the office don't help those seeking to avoid that annual gain. Consider Alice Moore, a University of Delaware employee who is trying to lose weight.

"You walk by to make a copy and you pick up a chocolate and it sneaks up on you," said Moore, an administrative assistant.

Yet, organizations that have tried to manage sweets in the offices end up abandoning the effort, said Sonya Angelone, a registered dietitian and consulting nutritionist in Marin County, Calif., who has worked with several HMOs. Even in the offices of cardiologists, Angelone has seen employees bringing in their grandmother's favorite recipe, like "brownies with everything oozing."

Managers sometimes find out the hard way that it's not an effective strategy to criticize what someone brings in to the office or enjoys eating, said Tara Gidus, a nutrition expert in Orlando, Fla., and a spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association.

An offhand comment like "I can't believe you're eating that!" or "Who brought this in?" can create yearlong conflict in the office, she said.

"Food choice is very personal," Gidus said. "There's a lot of emotion attached to food, especially around holiday time."

Gardner, the marketing professor, said any downside to holiday goodies is outweighed by the positives: "Wellness is not just physical. There are a lot of dimensions that come into play."