Sanders Has Faced Tough Times, But Bumpy Cake Remains Iconic
The Michigan staple was invented in 1913, and the bumps of buttercream are nostalgic for many
Rochester — I’m headed to the birthplace of Bumpy Cake.
A staple of Michigan dessert culture, the bumpy cake was once a staple in my own home. Every time my dad’s birthday rolled around, we bought him a Sanders Bumpy Cake. Just recently, I stopped into one of the still-standing locations on Mackinac Island—but what happened to all the other stores?
The Bumpy Cake was invented by Fred Sanders Schmidt in Detroit around 1913. Sanders’s first shop, which took after his middle name, opened on Woodward Avenue in downtown Detroit on June 17, 1875. They specialized in all sorts of sweet treats. The Sanders hot fudge and the cream puff (an oversized cream puff filled with a scoop of ice cream and drizzled with that same hot fudge) still remain iconic Sanders delicacies today.
The original Bumpy Cake came about as a twist on the devil’s food cake. Initially named “The Sanders Devil's Food Buttercream Cake” or the “Candy Kitchen Iced Cake,” the iconic cake consisted of two rich devil’s food cake layers, filled and topped with iconic “bumps” of buttercream coated in a velvety fudge icing. The name changed over time because of the iconic appearance. Customers would come in calling it “the cake with the bumps,” which transformed into what we know it as today.
According to their website, at its peak, the Sanders brand had more than 57 locations across the Great Lakes region. After financial strain, bankruptcy and the Covid pandemic, there are only three retail locations that fully maintain the Sanders brand.
After a series of acquisitions, the brand is now owned and operated by Second Nature Brands. While the three remaining shops dutifully stock all types of Sanders treats, you can still find some in Meijer and Kroger and online.
The three storefronts still standing are in Rochester, Clinton Township, and Mackinac Island. This week, I visited the Rochester location to see what you can still find at a physical Sanders shop today.
Rochester has a perfect downtown, with sprawling shops and many bustling restaurants. The store is simple, packed wall-to-wall with caramels of every variety. It has a couple of small tables with window views, a television playing videos of the process used to make Sanders treats, and a counter where you can order specialty chocolates and ice cream. This is also where you go to get the cream puff, which I acquired on my second visit.
But the real treat is at the back of the store.
The Bumpy Cakes are located in the back of the store in a fridge, adjacent to a fridge where you can grab some cream puff shells.
The iconic chocolate bumpy cake is here, along with two others: a carrot cake variant, which is made with the iconic buttercream bumps but is draped in cream cheese frosting, and a vanilla buttercream, which has always been my personal favorite. Yellow cake with a thick layer of Sanders buttercream (all bump, no coating) and toasted pecans. There’s also a vanilla and caramel variant, though it wasn’t available in-store.
They’re less iconic than the devil’s food cake, but just as good.
They sell slices of cake over the counter, so I enjoyed my bumpy cake in the sun! My slice was moist although a little hard to get my fork through, chilled from the fridge and all. There isn’t too much new to say about Bumpy Cake in terms of taste; it’s rich, fudgy, chocolatey and iconic, and just about every Michigander I know grew up with it. The bumps are always my favorite part, as I think the buttercream gives a light sweetness that cuts through all the heavy fudginess. The flavor’s certainly shifted over time, or perhaps that’s nostalgia talking.
There are tons of varieties of bumpy cake out there—bumpy cake cupcakes, bumpy cake chocolates, even bumpy cake that’s much the same, but with more buttercream and more bumps.
I just don’t think anything truly tops the original. None of the others are as iconic. The cake with the bumps just has staying power.
