Two chocolate cake sandwiches, both filled with white creme, both sold in
the same aisle for seventy-odd years. People have strong opinions about
which is better, and almost nobody can say why — because the differences
are real but nobody puts them side by side.
So let's actually do it.
They are not the same shape, and that changes everything
A Suzy Q is two flat rectangular slabs of chocolate cake with creme
spread between them. It is a sandwich in the literal sense: broad, flat,
and eaten in bites that take cake-creme-cake every time.
A Devil Dog is two elongated fingers of devil's food cake, curved on
top, with the creme running the length of the middle. It eats like a hot
dog bun — you can hold one end and work along it.
That geometry is the whole argument:
Cake-to-creme ratio. The Suzy Q's flat faces give more creme surface
per bite. The Devil Dog's rounded profile gives you more cake at the
ends and more creme in the middle, so the bite changes as you go.
Structural behaviour. A Suzy Q squashes. Press it and the creme goes
out the sides. A Devil Dog holds its shape because the curve stiffens it.
- Lunchbox survival. The Devil Dog wins this one, and it isn't close.
The crumb is genuinely different
Devil's food is a specific thing, not a synonym for chocolate cake: it uses
more fat and a softer crumb, and traditionally leans on cocoa rather than
melted chocolate. Drake's cake reads darker and slightly drier at the edge.
Hostess's chocolate cake is more open and spongier — closer in character to
the cake around a Ding Dong than to a bakery devil's food.
Neither is better. But if you have ever thought "these taste the same," it
is worth eating them within a minute of each other, which is harder than it
sounds because they are rarely sold together.
Drake's is a regional loyalty, not just a snack cake
Drake's is a Northeast brand, and in New York, New Jersey and New England
it carries the kind of allegiance usually reserved for pizza and bagels.
People who grew up with Devil Dogs do not accept substitutes, and they will
tell you so. Suzy Q's are the national answer from Hostess to the same idea
(both sit in our curated Snack Cakes & Pastries pantry).
Which means a lot of the "which is better" argument is really "which one
was in your house in 1994." That is not a criticism. Food memory is the
strongest kind there is, and it is why both products still exist.
Settle it properly
The honest way to test this is to eat both in the same sitting, at the same
temperature, with nothing in between. We sell a pack that exists for exactly
that — one of each:
If you already know which side you are on and just want a supply:
Two things worth knowing before you taste
Serve them at room temperature. Straight from a cold cupboard the creme
is stiff and reads waxy. Twenty minutes on the counter and it softens into
something much closer to what it is meant to be. This single change alters
the result of the taste test more than anything else on this page.
Eat the Devil Dog second. The Suzy Q's higher creme-per-bite coats your
palate. Going the other way, the Devil Dog's drier crumb tastes thin when it
shouldn't.
Our own tally, for whatever it is worth: the Devil Dog wins on texture and
the Suzy Q wins on the creme. If that sounds like a dodge, taste them
together and see whether you land somewhere different.
Featured Products in This Article
Taste the snacks discussed above, shipped fast directly from our NY warehouse!
