[Recipe] Guinness Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

A Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all!

On this day we celebrate all things Irish, I thought I’d share a recipe I’ve kept under my lucky green hat for a while now – a recipe for Guinness Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting. This is a moist, delicious cake, complimented nicely by the cream cheese glaze.

I’ve actually converted this recipe into a donuts today, but I’m posting the original cake recipe. To make donuts instead, just bake in a donut pan (about 10-12 minutes per batch).

I hope you enjoy this cake as much as we do.

[Recipe] Guinness Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

For the cake:

1 cup Guinness
1/2 cup plus 2 Tbsp butter
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
2 cups superfine sugar (granulated sugar works just fine)
3/4 cup sour cream (I substituted greek yogurt)
2 eggs
1 Tbsp vanilla extract (or substitute with rum extract)
2 cups flour
1 Tbsp baking soda

For the frosting (more like a glaze):

8 oz. cream cheese, at room temperature
1 1/4 cups icing sugar
1/4 cup buttermilk (whipping cream can be used here as well)

Preheat oven to 350F and butter and line a 9-inch springform pan or a bundt pan.

Pour the Guinness into a large wide saucepan, add the butter – in spoons or slices – and heat until the butter is melted.

Whisk in the cocoa and sugar.

Beat the sour cream with the eggs and vanilla.

Pour the sour cream mixture into the pan. Whisk.

Finally, whisk in the flour and baking soda.

Pour the cake batter into the greased and lined pan and bake for 45 minutes to an hour, relying on the toothpick test to let you know when the cake is done. Leave to cool completely in the pan on a cooling rack, as it is quite a damp cake.

When the cake’s completely cold, sit it on a flat platter.

To make the frosting: Lightly whip the cream cheese until smooth, sift over the confectioner’s sugar and then beat them both together. Or do this in a processor, putting the unsifted confectioner’s sugar in first and blitz to remove lumps before adding the cheese.

Add the cream and beat again until it makes a spreadable consistency. Ice only the top of the black cake so that it resembles the frothy top of a pint of Guinness.

Makes about 12 slices (or 24 donuts)