The ultimate moment of truth:Is it a handbag or a cake?
Is It Cake?has been one of Netflix’s top 10 most-watched shows since it debuted in March,with nearly 50 million hours of the show watched around the world last week. Australians have a particular taste for it,with the show now sitting in the top three. Inspired by a viral video showing someone cut into a Crocs sandal that was in fact food,Is It Cake? features a collection of boutique bakers doing their best to deceive a panel of judges by baking a cake that looks like a shoe,a burger or any number of different objects created over eight episodes of the show’s first season.
I first heard of this show when my kids asked if they could watch another episode after watching the first one the day before. In the top position on Netflix’s kids’ charts,Is It Cake?is a huge hit at my son’s school,and some of his friends have already binged (and spoiled) the entire season. Baffled that my son still wanted to watch another episode despite knowing how this inane-sounding premise ended,I knew I had to giveIs It Cake?a shot,so I fired up the first episode.
Dare you take these rubber ducks into the bath?
The opening five minutes ofIs It Cake? are fast and frantic,an utter fever dream. “This is a bowling ball,” announces the knife-wielding host Mikey Day. “And this is a cake.” He slices into the ball on his left,revealing its cakey insides to a shocked audience. We’re introduced to “nine amazing cake artists” who are asked to identify a cake in a lineup of six fast food dishes. After all the votes are locked in,the host unsheathes a samurai sword and starts slicing through each dish,shouting the name of the show until finally the cake is revealed.
How to trick the Is It Cake? judges
- Use a dense,sturdy cake,such as a mud cake,which is easiest to carve and is able to bear more weight than a sponge.
- Using an airbrush for painting will give you a more realistic look as you can control the shade and tone of your sculpted cake. The texture is important to make the cake look more realistic,and while there are several impression texture mats,moulds and stencils available from cake shops,you may be able to use things you have at home,including fruit nets or sieves.
- You will need to use non-cake items for structure and support. Some cakes may need a central timber dowel to prevent the cake from tipping over. Limbs and heavy appendages would be structurally safer made from rice krispy treats or Styrofoam,while tiny details are best made from fondant,modelling chocolate or gum paste.
From professional cake maker Dell Khalil ofCake Salon.
The pace and ridiculousness of this opening won me over immediately,and ifIs It Cake? was just 20 minutes of Mikey Day slicing things open with a sword,I’d be rapt. But sadly,everything slows to a crawl as we meet the three contestants who’ll be baking today’s cakes that look like things that aren’t cakes,and the show becomes a pretty standard baking competition,except here the contestants are trying to trick the judges instead of baking them something delicious.
My overly critical analysis of the cake show is met with an eye roll from my eight-year-old son,who gobbles up every one of Netflix’s baking shows with delight. There are more than 10 now,including three seasons of the cake-focusedSugar Rush,six seasons of amateur baking competitionNailed It! and one season of Just Desserts,hosted by Australia’s Adriano Zumbo.
This is easily his favourite genre of television,and he doesn’t even like cake that much.
His grandmother – my mother-in-law – has been a professional cake artist for over a decade,producing cakes for our family over the years that look like the kids’ favourite toys,video game characters and even an extremely realistic bowl of pho. Having an extremely talented cake maker for a grandma means you grow up with so many crazy,elaborate cakes that you start to take them for granted from an early age and lose a bit of that wonder that makes you look at the edible art in front of you and ask yourself the name of this Netflix show.
Nearly 40 minutes per episode is a little too long and slow for me,but I respectIs It Cake?’s attempt to show how much work goes into these cakes. As a former chef,I know how hard it is just to make food that looks like food. Cake makers on this level are closer to sculptors,working with materials that are incredibly fragile and unstable. You may laugh in disbelief when the contestants are given eight hours (at least three times more time than we’re used to in a cooking show) to create their masterpieces,but you’ll quickly learn how crucial every minute is when it comes to baking,sculpting and painting each deceptive cake,only to watch it get sliced in half by a man with a samurai sword.
Andrew Levins is a DJ,former chef,podcaster and writer. His first kids’ novel,Nelson:Pumpkins and Aliens,is out now.
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