Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes with Bailey’s cream cheese frosting
Time: 2+ hrs | Difficulty: 3/5 | Yield: 10 tall cupcakes, or 12 smaller cupcakes!
These cupcakes are DELICIOUS. They’re so moist and chocolatey, and have a deep, nutty flavor that comes from the Guinness. The cake recipe is adapted and scaled down from Nigella Lawson’s Guinness Cake recipe, where you make the whole thing in one big pot, and then transfer to a cake pan. I prefer making this recipe in cupcake form, because they’re way easier to store, they’re already portioned out when you want to eat them, and you can frost them individually when you’re in the mood for one. The frosting here is cream-cheese based, because I’m not a huge fan of buttercream (too sweet and also hard to make without a stand mixer), and it adds an amazing tanginess to the dark flavor of the cupcakes. And a bonus—this recipe uses Guinness, Jameson Irish Whiskey, AND Bailey’s Irish Cream. Talk about a trifecta!!!
Ingredients/Tools:
For the cake:
1/2 cup of Guinness
8 tbsp unsalted butter (1 stick)
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup sour cream
1 egg
A few tbsp of Jameson whiskey, reduced down in a little saucepan to about a 1/2 tbsp worth
1 cup flour
1 1/4 tsp of baking soda
A heavy bottomed pot
Cupcake pan
A whisk
A big bowl
For the frosting:
4 oz cream cheese
3ish tbsp of Bailey’s Irish Cream
3ish tbsp of confectioner’s sugar
A bowl
A whisk or fork
Method:
Pour the Guinness into the pot. Slice up the butter into chunks and add it into the pot. Turn on the heat and melt the butter into the Guinness.
When the butter is melted, add in the cocoa powder and whisk or stir until incorporated. Do the same with the sugar.
In a bowl, whisk the egg, then whisk in the sour cream and the Jameson. Add it all to the big chocolatey Guinness pot.
Add in the flour and stir well until there are no lumps and it’s all well incorporated. Then add in the baking soda.
Preheat the oven to 425°. Grease the little cupcake wells with butter. Then cut out some little circles of baking parchment and line the bottoms of the cupcake wells.
Pour the cake mix into the cupcake wells. Then bake for about 12-20 minutes, depending on your oven. Stick the cupcakes with a skewer or a long fork to check when they’re done—if it comes out clean, they’re done baking.
While the cupcakes are cooking and cooling, make the frosting: put the cream cheese in a bowl, and whisk it up a bit to loosen it. Add in the Bailey’s and whisk it all around. It should be fairly liquidy at this point—add in the confectioner’s sugar until it becomes a frosting-like consistency.
Frost the cupcakes when you’re ready to eat them, and enjoy!!