Crystallised Ginger and Beer Cake

I've missed joining in Random Recipes for a few months now for various reasons so I'm really pleased that I managed to bake something for it this month. Dom from Belleau Kitchen set us the task of using the internet to do a random recipe search and his only criteria is that the recipe is something sweet. I  knew what ingredient I wanted to start with as I found 2 bags of crystallised ginger which I bought ages ago and it seems the perfect time of the year for a ginger cake. I also wanted to incorporate beer as Kate from What Kate Baked recently posted a Honey, Ginger and Beer Cake which I've bookmarked to try. So with that in mind, I typed "crystallised ginger and beer cake" into google and this is the first image result. My cake looks nothing like the picture but it definitely tasted good. 

I made a few changes to the recipe - I used black treacle instead of light molasses and I added in chopped crystallised ginger to the cake for extra flavour and texture. I didn't get to try any of the cake as J took it to work and I'm not a huge fan of ginger. His colleagues claim that this is the best cake so far which is high praise indeed. The cake was moist, sticky and very gingery. They particularly liked the bits of ginger in the cake and in the icing itself. They couldn't really taste the beer as the predominant flavour was ginger so I may have to tweak the recipe a little. Overall, a huge success and I am sure I'll be baking this again particularly in the colder, winter months. I am also quite keen to try a slice despite my dislike of ginger after the positive comments! 

As mentioned, I'm entering this to Random Recipes hosted by Dom from Belleau Kitchen. The theme is random internet search for something sweet. 

It also fits in nicely with Love Cake hosted by Ness from Jibber Jabber UK as the theme this month is 'dark'. 

 adding the dark treacle 

 adding chopped crystallised ginger 

 lovely dark cake - you can see the bits of ginger in it

 add whipped cream frosting 

 decorate with more crystallised ginger 

Recipe adapted from bon appetit

For the cake

225g butter

200g brown sugar

315g plain flour

2 teaspoon ground ginger

2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

2 eggs

350g dark treacle 

250mls Guinness stout 

150g chopped crystallised ginger 

For the frosting

3 x 300mls whipping cream

45g icing sugar, sifted

approximately 10 pieces of crystallised ginger, chopped and extra for decoration

• Preheat the oven to 180C. 
• Cream the butter and sugar for a few minutes
• Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing between each addition.
• Add in the treacle and mix.
• Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl.
• Pour 1/3 of the flour mixture followed by the stout and continue alternating the dry and wet ingredients until it's all incorporated.
• Finally stir in the chopped crystallised ginger.
• Divide the mixture evenly between 2 sandwich tins and bake for approximately 40 minutes or until cooked and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. (I couldn't find my second tin so I baked mine in 1 large tin which took about 75 minutes to cook) 
• Allow the cakes to cool completely on a wire rack before decorating.
• Make the frosting by placing the whipping cream and icing sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer.
• Mix until the cream holds it's own shape - this takes quite a while due to the volume of cream. 
• Stir in the chopped crystallised ginger.
• Place 1 cake on a cake board or serving plate and spread a generous amount of frosting on top. Place the second cake on top and cover the top and sides with remaining frosting. 
• Decorate with chopped crystallised ginger as shown or as desired. 

Chocolate Guinness Celebration Cake

Recently a work colleague celebrated her wedding anniversary and I thought it would be nice to make a celebration cake for it. As she's Irish I thought a chocolate guinness cake would be perfect and the happy couple were absolutely delighted. I made a double recipe so had enough for 1 big cake and 20 cupcakes. I think almost everyone had 2 cupcakes that day and I've had repeated requests for this cake since especially from those that missed out. This cake ranks in the top 5 that I've baked so far for the team this year and trust me I've baked a lot of cakes! 

Just to jazz up the cake a little, I decided to make chocolate decorations in the shape of champagne bottles using a mould I bought from Lakeland. I made 3 different types of chocolate but unfortunately could not get the white ones out of the mould. I also struggled with the milk ones. Luckily, I had enough to decorate the cake but not completely cover it as originally planned. Has anyone used this mould before? I tempered the chocolate as instructed, filled it and allowed it to set before turning them out. No amount of tapping and coaxing would get the other bottles out. 

As this is a chocolate celebration cake, I'm sending it to We Should Cocoa hosted by Choclette from Chocolate Log Blog. Sadly, we bid farewell to WSC co-creator Chele from Chocolate Teapot who has retired from blogging.  We Should Cocoa turns 3 this month so Choclette has asked us to create a chocolate showstopper cake inspired by the first episode of the Great British Bake Off. This is not quite up to par with the showstoppers on the show but it's a great celebration cake so I hope it will suffice.

 new mould from lakeland

 I tempered 3 different chocolates 

 made lots of cupcakes... 

 and 1 large cake 

 cover liberally with frosting  

 I love the little chocolate bottles! 

For the cake
250ml guinness
250g butter
75 cocoa powder
400g caster sugar
142mls sour cream
2 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
275g plain flour
2.5 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

For the topping
300g cream cheese
150g icing sugar
125mls double or whipping cream

• Preheat oven to 180C.
• Butter and line a 23cm springform tin. 
• Pour Guinness into a large wide saucepan, add butter - in spoons or slices - and heat until the butter's melted, at which time you should whisk in the cocoa and sugar. 
• Beat the sour cream with the eggs and vanilla and the pour into the brown, buttery, beery pan and finally whisk in the flour and bicarbonate of soda. 
• Pour the cake batter into the prepared tin and bake for about 45 minutes to an hour. 
• Leave to cool completely in the tin on a cooling rack as it is quite a damp cake. 
• To make the topping, lightly whip the cream cheese until smooth.
• Sieve over the icing sugar and then beat them both together. 
• Add the cream and beat again until it makes a spreadable consistency. 
• Ice the top of the black cake so it resembles the frothy top of Guinness.

Baileys and Guinness Layer Cake

I wanted to make a special cake for a friend's birthday so I decided to use my new checkerboard cake pan set that I bought from America. My friend is not really a dessert or cake person so I struggled to choose the perfect cake to celebrate. However, he does like a drink (or two) so I decided to make a boozy cake with Baileys and Guinness. The final cake was delicious and very boozy indeed (I was too liberal with the alcohol!) and everyone enjoyed it.

Unfortunately it was more a layer cake than a checkerboard cake. The cakes spread quite a lot during baking therefore obliterating the checkerboard effect. Plus the cake batters cooked at different times so the Baileys cake was slightly overdone and the Guinness cake was slightly under. Next time, I'll make a sponge recipe and add flavour and colour so that the cakes will cook evenly and hopefully I'll get the checkerboard effect as seen on the box. For now, let's just pretend that I intended to make a layer cake from the beginning :) 

I'm submitting this to AlphaBakes hosted by me and co-hosted by Caroline from Caroline_Makes. It's a monthly challenge where we bake from a random letter each month. This month, the letter is "B" which is perfect as I used a whole bottle of Baileys! Have you made your AlphaBakes entry yet? 

 I used a whole (small) bottle of Baileys! oops!

 checkerboard pan set 

 It has a nifty separator which you place on the cake tin then fill the cake batters in alternating colours 

 I had leftover batter so I made some cupcakes 

 As you can see the Baileys cake spread out a lot so you can't really see the ring effect with the Guinness cake 

 This layer is even worse! 

 Cover with frosting and add candles. 

 Layer cake as it was always meant to be ;) 

I made 2 recipes of each cake as 1 recipe was not quite enough - the checkerboard cake pans are quite large. I did have leftover batter to make 11 cupcakes (Recipes below are for 1 recipe)

For the Baileys cake

125g butter
200g caster sugar
2 eggs
250g plain flour (I used self raising flour which in hindsight was not a good idea!)
1 cup or more of Baileys (adjust to taste)

• Cream the butter and sugar.
• Add the eggs, sugar and flour.
• Finally stir in the Baileys.
• Alternatively, you can mix all the ingredients together in a mixer.

For the Guinness cake

I used Nigella's chocolate Guinness Cake recipe which is available on her website.

For the chocolate ganache

200g dark chocolate, chopped
250mls double cream
25g butter (optional)

• Heat double cream in a small saucepan and bring it to the boil.
• Remove from the heat and add chopped chocolate and butter and whisk until smooth.

Chocolate Guinness Cake

This is a belated birthday post for a colleague of mine who celebrated a special birthday recently.  She invited me to a lovely BBQ and I made Nigella's Chocolate Guinness Cake to bring out the Irish in her :) I have made these previously in a cupcake form with the addition of baileys ganache and buttercream but this cake is on a whole other level. It's really moist and soft and absolutely delicious with the cream cheese frosting on top. A definite hit at the party I think! 

I also made a Victoria sponge cake for her actual birthday. It was made very late at night and some of my writing icing tubes had dried hence the rather wobbly writing. I don't think anyone took too much notice as the cake disappeared very quickly. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SIOBHAN!! 

For the cake

250ml guinness

250g butter

75 cocoa powder

400g caster sugar

142mls sour cream

2 eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

275g plain flour

2.5 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

For the topping

300g cream cheese

150g icing sugar

125mls double or whipping cream

Method

• Preheat oven to 180C.
• Butter and line a 23cm springform tin. 
• Pour Guinness into a large wide saucepan, add butter - in spoons or slices - and heat until the butter's melted, at which time you should whisk in the cocoa and sugar. 
• Beat the sour cream with the eggs and vanilla and the pour into the brown, buttery, beery pan and finally whisk in the flour and bicarbonate of soda. 
• Pour the cake batter into the prepared tin and bake for about 45 minutes to an hour.  
• Leave to cool completely in the tin on a cooling rack as it is quite a damp cake. 
• To make the topping, lightly whip the cream cheese until smooth.
• Sieve over the icing sugar and then beat them both together. 
• Add the cream and beat again until it makes a spreadable consistency. 
• Ice the top of the black cake so it resembles the frothy top of Guinness. 

Recipe for the sponge cake can be found here 

Guinness Cupcakes with Baileys ganache filling and Baileys buttercream icing

Happy New Year 2011!! Hope everyone had a good time. Incidentally my blog is also 1 year old today so happy birthday to my blog :) Lots of reasons to celebrate.

I went to a fabulous New Years Eve party and made some boozy cupcakes for the occasion.  I decided on a slightly Irish theme - Guinness cupcakes with Baileys ganache filling topped with Baileys buttercream icing! I had lots of ganache left over so I rolled those into little truffle balls.  I have to admit that I didn't follow the recipe exactly when measuring the Baileys. I just kept pouring until it looked about right! The Baileys is quite strong in the ganache and icing but I don't think anyone got drunk on my cakes! The guinness cake was quite dense and you can't really taste the Guinness in it.  I made a batch of vanilla cupcakes today to go with the leftover Baileys frosting which works better as the frosting by itself is delicious.
Here's to another year of fabulous baking. Thank you everyone for reading, commenting and/or stopping by. I hope 2011 brings you everything you wish for and more.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011!! 

 guinness and butter 

 ready to go in the oven -the batter is quite liquid but cooks well 

 adding Baileys to the chocolate ganache - i used a 'glug' method! 

 make a hole in the centre of the cake 

 fill with ganache and replace the cover

 cakes and truffles at the party 

Makes ~ 20
For the Guinness cake 
250mls Guinness
225g butter
85g cocoa powder
220g flour
250g caster sugar
1.5 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
157mls sour cream

For the Baileys ganache filling
225g bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
157mls heavy cream
28g butter
2 teaspoon Baileys Irish cream (I just poured - see pic!)

For the Baileys buttercream frosting
113g unsalted butter, at room temperature
330-440g icing sugar, sifted
4-8 tablespoon Baileys Irish cream (again I just poured it in!)

• Preheat oven to 180C.
• Combine Guinness and butter in a medium pan over medium heat. 
• Add the cocoa powder and whisk until smooth.
• Remove from the heat and allow to cool slighlty. 
• In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.  
• In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together the eggs and sour cream to blend. 
• Add the guinness-butter mixture and beat just to combine.
• Mix in the dry ingredients on low speed until just incorporated.
• Divide the batter evenly between the cupcake liners, filling them about 2/3 to 3/4 full.
• Bake until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean, about 17 minutes.
• Allow to cool in the pan for 5-10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. 
• To make the ganache filling, place the chocolate in a heatproof bowl. 
• Heat the cream in a small saucepan until simmering, then pour it over the melted chocolate.
• Let sit for one minute and then whisk until smooth. 
• Add the butter and Baileys and stir until combined. 
• Set aside to let the ganache cool until it is thick enough to be piped. 
• Meanwhile, cut out a portion from the centre of the cupcake.  Once the ganache has reached the correct consistency, transfer it to a piping bag fitted with a wide tip and pipe it into the cupcakes. (I was in a hurry so mine were a little liquid but it still worked fine)
• To make the frosting, place the butter in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment.
• Beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy.
• Gradually add the icing sugar until it is all incorporated. 
• Mix in the Baileys until smooth.