Updated story
A bakery owner and former baker are faced off in a lawsuit the defendant called "Muffin-Gate" in north suburban Chicago.
When Mary Ann Huppert left her job at Evanston, Ill.'s Fraîche Bakery, located at 815 Noyes St., she took with her two cookbooks she had used while working there, WGN reports. Now, she's engaged in a battle with her former boss, shop owner Susan Davis Friedman, over recipes the latter claims are proprietary.
Huppert's husband told the station that the recipes his wife left with came from the Internet or cookbooks she had purchased herself, and contends that she has every right to keep them.
Bakery owner Friedman disagrees. She claims the recipes taken were developed internally and contain shop secrets, including the instructions for making the bakery's famous "cinnamon bombs," CBS Chicago reports. Huppert reportedly told Friedman she would have to sue her to get the materials back, and Friedman complied--a hearing on the lawsuit, which argues the recipes are the bakery's property, is scheduled for later this week.
The bakery's signature cinnamon bombs may be worth fighting for -- Time-Out Chicago named them one of the best things they'd eaten in 2011.
According to the Chicago Tribune, the lawsuit states the recipes “were developed, assembled tested and honed over the course of 3 ½ years. That work cannot be readily reproduced. The damage to Fraiche’s goodwill from the inability to offer these items would be irreparable because it cannot be measured in money damages.”
On Wednesday, the Tribune reported that the bakery dropped the lawsuit against Huppert.
The suit was filed by Friedman's husband and attorney Benson Friedman.