Happy St. Patrick's Day

I'm not one to turn down an occasion to bake for, and Paddy's Day is no exception. Although I point blank refused to do something green. Instead I went with another stereotypical image of Ireland: Guinness. 

After a bit of Googling, I decided to go with Nigella's Chocolate Guinness Cake recipe, but in cupcake form. Nigella's recipe makes one single layer 9" cake, so I figured I'd get 12, maybe 16 cupcakes. I actually got 36 and ran out of icing after 12. So I've adjusted the recipe below to make 16 cupcakes, with icing. 

I was skeptical of how these would turn out, because I absolutely hate the taste Guinness. But, I was really surprised with the results. The cupcakes were light and fluffy, and they had a slight bitterness to them which went lovely with the cream cheese frosting. Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing that I accidentally made too many cupcakes!!

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

(adapted from Nigella Lawson)

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes
125ml Guinness
125g unsalted butter
40g cocoa powder
200g caster sugar
70g sour cream
1 large egg
1/2 tbsp vanilla extract
135g plain flour
1 1/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Preheat your oven to 180ºC and line a cupcake tin. Pour the Guinness into a saucepan and add the butter. Heat until the butter is melted. Remove from the heat and whisk in the cocoa and sugar. Beat the sour cream, egg and vanilla together and add to the mixture. Finally, whisk in the flour and bicarb. Pour into your cupcake cases, filling about 3/4 of the way up and bake for about 12-15 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool on a wire rack.

Cream Cheese Frosting
450g cream cheese
225g icing sugar
185ml double cream

Beat the cream cheese until light and fluffy. Gradually, add in the icing sugar until completely incorporated. Add the cream and beat until it makes a spreadable consistency.