Week 17: Chocolate Stout Cupcakes

Remember my deep love for all things cupcake?! Does it surprise you to learn I've never made a batch from scratch before?

Up until now, all my cupcake-making adventures involved pre-mixed boxes. Despite it being Monday, last week I finally rolled up my sleeves and made my own cupcakes from scratch.

Chocolate Stout Cupcakes, that is.

(Side note, aren't these silicone cupcake holders my mom got me for Easter adorable?!)

Ingredients:

• 3/4 c unsweetened cocoa
• 2 c sugar
• 2 c all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch fine salt
• 1 bottle stout beer
• 1 stick butter, melted
• 1 T vanilla extract
• 3 large eggs
• 3/4 c sour cream (I subbed plain Greek yogurt)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the cocoa, sugar, flour, baking soda, and salt.

In another medium mixing bowl, combine the stout, melted butter, and vanilla. Beat in eggs, 1 at time. Mix in sour cream until thoroughly combined and smooth. Gradually mix the dry ingredients into the wet mixture.

Lightly grease 24 muffin tins. Divide the batter equally between muffin tins, filling each 3/4 full. Bake for about 12 minutes and then rotate the pans. Bake another 12 to 13 minutes until risen, nicely domed, and set in the middle but still soft and tender. Cool before turning out.

And the recipe on the website for the frosting calls for powdered sugar. That I did not have on hand, but I had heavy cream. So I scoured the Internet and came up with this recipe for Whipped Cream Cream Cheese Frosting.

This was also the first time I've ever piped on frosting! Usually I'll just slather it on with a knife and make those messy peaks. But since buying piping bags in Sonoma last weekend, I figured this was as good as any time to start! Regardless, the messy look still shone through with my piped whipped cupcakes... Soooo, I really need to learn techniques. I tried to make flower petals instead of spiral frosting toppers, but they turned out heinous. Instead, I just swirled right on top haha. If you know of any websites/videos on how to pipe pretty designs, please send them my way :)

Now about the beer:

Yes there is an entire bottle of beer in my batter. Mixing it all together in my KitchenAid, you could DEFINITELY smell the stout. It reminded me of staying at a bar near closing and smelling the booze freshly spilled all over counters and floors ;) Ok, it was actually more of a pleasant aroma. And, interestingly enough, despite baking for 24 minutes, you can distinctly taste the beer in the cupcakes! It is interesting and very subtle, which I think makes for a delicious cupcake. Kind of reminds me of the time I dumped a whole lot of Bailey's into chocolate chip cookies....

Sensing a theme here? Seriously, try this. Or at least try alcoholic baked goods. It's kind of fun, in a childish-I-want-to-be-an-adult sort of way.

One final note. I found this recipe because I had all that stout on hand. Why?! Because I found alcoholic whipped cream at Total Wine and bought some when my sister was in town. My sister bought German Chocolate and I went with Amaretto. We honest-to-God tried whipped cream shots in our mouths, but this was too much. It literally tastes like taking shots. Stings the mouth, even.

I initially thought they'd be really good on top of a glass of stout. I've actually had whipped cream on top of a pumpkin beer before, in a restaurant, so this seemed similar. Upon contact with the beer, the alcoholic whipped cream curdled. Needless to say, I didn't finish it, at all. As unpleasant as that sounds, who knows, maybe it'll be decent on top of stout cupcakes...