Chocolate Stout Cake with Salted Caramel Filling & Bailey's Frosting

Happy St. Patrick's Day! 

Those of you who follow our space here know that baking isn't really our focus or passion and mostly because I truly feel I pretty much suck at it. But the success experienced making this cake may change that attitude.

Our theme for Supper Club this past weekend was St. Patrick's day. Our lovely hosts were making traditional corned beef and we were assigned dessert. I ran across this Chocolate Stout cake on Pinterest posted by Closet Cooking that seemed like the perfect option for our dessert offering to the meal.

Cake making has always seemed a bit intimidating to me. I mean just the amount of ingredients I have to drag out of the cupboard that I have to stand on a ladder to get down is enough to make me not bake on most days. But he explained this cake made with Guinness was pretty simple and delicious. And I found that to be true.

I followed his advice and first butter the pans and added parchment to prevent sticking. This helped getting the cake out of the pan a breeze.

The chocolate, Guinness and butter create the most rich and lush chocolate mixture you can dream of so simply.

The batter ends up being thick and dense in appearance but creates the most light and fluffy cake texture.

While the cake was cooling I decided I wanted to add a filling to the middle layer of the cake and I found a recipe for Salted Caramel Glaze on The Hungry Housewife blog that seemed like the perfect middle for our cake. This glaze was simple and wonderful.

And the Bailey's cream cheese frosting was literally divine. Truly what a simple cake that turned out fantastic. A definite must make for chocolate lovers. The body the stout adds to the chocolate cake is detectable and wonderful.

 RECIPE:

Chocolate Stout Cake with Salted Caramel Filling & Bailey's Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients

1. 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
2. 1 cup stout (such as Guinness)
3. 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
4. 2 cups all purpose flour
5. 2 cups sugar
6. 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
7. 3/4 teaspoon salt
8. 2 large eggs
9. 2/3 cup sour cream

Directions

1. Melt the butter in a sauce pan, remove from heat and let cool a bit.
2. Mix in the stout and cocoa powder.
3. Mix the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt in a large bowl.
4. Mix the eggs and sour cream in another large bowl.
5. Mix the stout mixture into the egg mixture.
6. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet.
7. Pour the batter into one or two greased and parchment lined circular cake pan(s).
8. Bake in a preheated 350F oven until a toothpick pushed into the center comes out clean. If you bake it in a single pan then it should take about 40-50 minutes. If you bake it in two cake pans then it should take about 20-30 minutes.

Salted Caramel Glaze

1. 5 tablespoons Butter
2. ½ cup packed Dark Brown Sugar
3. ⅓ cup Heavy Cream
4. Pinch Salt
5. ¼ teaspoon Vanilla Extract
6. ⅔ cup Powdered Sugar,sifted

Salted Caramel Glaze

1. In a medium saucepan, bring the butter, dark brown sugar, heavy cream and salt to a rolling boil, stirring constantly.
2. Boil for ONE minute, stirring constantly.
3. Remove from heat, stir in vanilla extract.
4. Add about ½ cup of the powdered sugar and whisk until smooth.
5. Continue to whisk in powdered sugar by the tablespoon until you reach your desired consistency.
6. Remove the cake from the fridge, place on a cake plate and pour the salted caramel glaze over the top.
7. Sprinkle the Fleur de Sel over the glaze.

Bailey's Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients

1. 4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
2. 1 cup confectioners sugar
3. 3 tablespoons of Bailey’s Irish cream

Directions

1. Cream the cream cheese.
2. Slowly mix in the confectioners sugar.
3. Slowly mix in the Irish cream