The Untold Truth Of Sugar Rush

There are unscripted baking shows for semi-pro and home bakers (The Great British Bake Off) and baking shows for newbies and non-bakers (we're looking at you, Nailed It!). Then there's Sugar Rush, the Netflix show that pits four teams of professional bakers in a three-round competition for a chance to win $10,000. The rounds are designed to give bakers a chance to show off their best skills in cupcake-, confection-, and cake-making; bakers are given two hours to make and decorate their cupcakes before moving into confection. Whatever time the bakers save in the first two rounds can be added to the cake round, which is set as three hours long (via Plano Magazine).

The bakers are playing to a very demanding audience. The show features two judges — Candace Nelson, the creator of cupcake giant Sprinkles Bakery, and Australian pastry chef Adriano Zumbo (who has his own reality show on Netflix, by the way — Zumbo's Just Desserts). The show is hosted by the Game Show Network's Hunter March (via The Orange County Register). "It's going to be hard because there's always a time element and you can imagine they don't have enough time to do amazing things but somehow they manage to do them anyway," Nelson tells The Orange County Register. "I'm just so happy I'm on this side of the table. I love judging."

One reviewer at Bustle called Sugar Rush a bit of Chopped and a bit of Masterchef. While the ingredients are no surprise, the themes are, and chefs are innovative enough to make their creations pleasant surprises. The show informs the audience as well, because it can give intermediate bakers tips on how to up their pastry game.

Based on the number of unintentional baking fails we see on the show and particularly when contestants' backs are up against the clock, we think it would be a stretch to think that Sugar Rush is staged. But Nelson said making mistakes is part of the game. "Baking is a precise science and it's hard to backpedal," she said. "If you figure out down the line you forgot the baking soda or you've done something else wrong you really have to start again. It's not like savory cooking hot kitchen style where you can save it on the fly."