Thursday, March 17, 2011

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes

I have, for your amusement, the cupcake I've been most excited to make! I found this idea on several sites, but liked the recipe off this one best, despite making it my own in a few ways. It's dark chocolate Guinness cupcake, chocolate marshmallow Jameson ganache, and Bailey's buttercream frosting. BAM! How's that for some St. Paddy's Day action?!



Cupcake:
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and line your cupcake pan with some kick ass green cupcake liners.


In a microwave safe bowl, heat up a little past melting, 1 stick of butter and 1 and 1/2 cup Guinness. Mix in 3/4 cup powdered, unsweetened cocoa and 2 cups dark brown sugar. I used Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa.




In a separate bowl, beat together 3/4 cup sour cream, 2 eggs, and 1 tsp vanilla. Whisk the butter and sour cream mixes together. Whisk in 2 and 1/2 cups AP flour and 1 tbsp baking soda into the wet mix.



Pour the batter into the the liners, filling 3/4th of the way full. Bake for 20 minutes. Check to make sure they're cooked through by inserting a toothpick into the thickest part of the thickest cupcake.



Ganache:
I deviated pretty seriously here, since I was just too lazy to go out and get some heavy whipping cream. So, this section is all me. Lol. In a microwave safe bowl, melt 3 tbsp butter, 3/4 cup semisweet morsels, and a bag (10.5 oz) of marshmallows. Pop it into the microwave and heat for 30 second intervals. Mix throughly after each 30 seconds.




Add Jameson to taste. I honestly couldn't taste it after 3 tbsp. So, I ended up using 5 tbsp because I only bought one of the 50ml bottles and ran out. I would have  probably added more.


Hollow out the middle of the cupcake and pipe in the ganache. I used a plastic zip-top bag and cut a small hole in the bottom.




Frosting:
I went in a different direction with this too. The Bailey's is really strong in the frosting, so I only used 2 tbsp. The original recipe called for 4 to 8! That's crazy! Soften a stick of butter on the counter.


Use an electric mixer and beat the butter until light and fluffy. Add in 2 tbsp of Bailey's. Beat until combined.


Add 4 cups of confectioner's sugar, 1 cup at a time, so that the sugar doesn't go flying out of the bowl. Add in 2 tbsp milk, or until as fluffy as you'd like.






As with the ganache, put the frosting in a piping bag. I used a star tip. Decorate as you'd like. Try not to get drunk off cupcakes. Party hard, but please use a designated driver. I have few viewers, I'd like you all to remain alive. Kthxbai.

4 comments:

  1. These were DELICIOUS!

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  2. These look delightful. A good trick for hollowing out cupcakes is taking a syringe and cutting the tip off, so that you basically have a little hole puncher. You punch the holes in the cake, and pop the cake out of the syringe. Most pharmacies will give the syringes out for free, so I've used this method before when making alcoholic cupcakes and it works pretty well!

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  3. Awesome! I think it's my favorite yet!

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  4. @Suze,
    That's a good tip, thank you. :D You could also use that technique to fill the cupcakes if you have a looser ganache. The way I hollowed out the cupcakes was using a toothpick to "saw" a circle, with the bottom of the toothpick angled toward the center. It gives you a cone shape.

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