An ugly sight greeted the staff of the renowned Balmain patisserie Adriano Zumbo when they arrived at work yesterday morning: broken glass, a busted front door, ripped up benches, a storeroom in chaos and a big hollow square of air where the safe used to be. ''We're trying to finalise the details now,'' a distressed Zumbo office manager, Natasha Ward, told The Diary. ''The [Unity Hall] pub closed at 2am next door and [the burglars] basically punched the glass, got to the lock and got in, ripped up the benches and ripped up the safe.'' Ward said it looks as if they weren't first-timers either. ''They switched the cameras off and then jack-hammered [the safe] which was bolted down, and took the weekend earnings. There were cakes and macarons everywhere.'' Ward said they were scratching their heads as to how no one had noticed the earth-quaking stirrings going on at such an hour (''The taxi rank is right outside). ''The police have dusted the place and found a few fingerprints but can't guarantee anything. They could be anybody's.'' It fell to Ward, who estimated the cost of the break-in to be between $25,000 and $30,000, to tell the boss, the one-time MasterChef guest and all-round pastry tsar, Adriano Zumbo. ''He was all right,'' she said. One hopes the recipes were not in the safe. In the meantime, shopkeepers are asked to keep an eye out for punters trying to pass sticky banknotes and furtively dabbing icing sugar from the corners of their mouths.

STARS IN TRAINING

Adriano Zumbo ... his Balmain patisserie was ransacked. Credit:Helen Nezdropa

It's been the one showbiz rumour that's had the stars and agents jostling for position and now Channel Nine has finally said yes, it will be airing a local version of Celebrity Apprentice. Based on the hit American reality series that's effectively a very long job interview, and produced by Fremantle Media for Nine, the series will pit a pack of local actors, sports people, doctors, politicians and more - or what the network has called ''intriguing people'' - against each other to win the chance to work for Mark Bouris, one of the country's most successful businessmen and chairman/co-founder of wealth management company Yellow Brick Road. Using their fame, contacts and whatever they've learned to get to the top of their respective heaps, the celebs will have to work as individuals and teams to raise money for a selection of charities. And they'll have to actually do it themselves. They will have no support team of agents, managers and personal assistants. They'll have long hours and tough challenges - all under the spotlight of the cameras … so why would they do it? Because the winner gets (a huge boost to their profile and) $100,000 in prize money. In celebrity money, that's 50 pairs of shoes or half a new car!

A WIZARD AT NUMBERS