Netflix’s hot mess of a baking competition series “Nailed It!” debuts its sixth season Wednesday. In honor of the the show’s return, we spoke with judge and co-host Jacques Torres about how these amateur bakers could actually win the reality contest — even though most of them are predisposed to epic fails — by avoiding the “biggest mistake” he and co-host Nicole Byer have seen.
“We always have at least one baker, sometimes three bakers, that forget the clock,” Torres, who is known as Mr. Chocolate for his world-renowned confections, tells TheWrap. “This is the biggest mistake that they make, they forget the clock. They forget that an hour and a half, or an hour and 25 minutes, come to an end. So they will take their time at the beginning.”
He continued: “Also, what they do a lot of time, they don’t make a roadmap on their mind. They don’t think, ‘OK, during the time that’s baking, I will do that. When that done is ready and the cake is coming out, I’ll put that in the freeze. I’m making my buttercream, the cake needs to be cold to be put together.’ They really don’t think about the whole thing. And they kind of come up with things suddenly and forget it. So they will put buttercream — so they don’t remember butter melts — buttercream on top of a hot cake. So cakes collapse if you do that. Cakes are not cold and when put together then you have a catastrophe. And usually they don’t collapse when you do it, they collapse the last 10 minutes of the show. So that’s always very funny. And that’s, you know, all the time. So we have, six episodes, six pretty funny fails.”
On this season of “Nailed It!,” the bakers will take on paranormal pastries, celebrate Black History, and attempt to re-create chocolate masterpieces inspired by Torres in hopes of winning that $10,000 prize.
Guest judges for Season 6 include Sam Richardson, Wayne Brady, Reggie Watts, Big Freedia, June Diane Raphael and Sasheer Zamata”.
But Torres, who is a full-time judge, says the words of wisdom he gives to his bakers at the end of each episode is really meant to help them succeed, not just poke fun at their messes. And then, of course, he leaves the niceties up to Byer.
“The advice I give the bakers are real advice,” Torres said. “I really try to look at what they do, the way they do it, and when I’m in front of the table and I talk to them, I will tell them, ‘OK, this is the way you did it, and it was fine until that time. But then you did that, that and that, and that’s where everything starts to collapse. And this is a mistake that you make. And this is why you did not succeed.’ So those advice are real, even if it’s not mean, we give that advice with a big smile and we laugh with them. But the advice is real and Nicole is always there to make it more fun. She is a very talented comedian. And she will make them laugh and she would bring that lightness to the show. But that advice is always real.”
“Nailed It!” Season 6 launches Wednesday on Netflix.