a moist and dark chocolate cake, perfect for st. patrick's day! too late for this year unfortunately, sorry about that. but at least you can get to try it a few times before next st. patrick!
the texture and the taste are really amazing. if you don't know what's in it, we're not sure you can actually find that it's guinness, but you can definitely taste something "unusual".
the topping brings a different taste with the whisky, and the cream cheese adds a salty flavor. we like using mascarpone for the topping to bring some creaminess, but if you prefer something less creamy you can use more cream cheese and less mascarpone. there are a lot of guinness and chocolate cake recipes on the web. we took a look at some of them, but we were mostly inspired by un dejeuner de soleil's recipe. we adapted her recipe, putting more chocolate, and less (really less) sugar. the topping is also different, with more mascarpone, but as we said before, you can adapt it depending on your preferences.
for one large cake:
for the cake:
40 cl guinness
170 g cane sugar
240 g flour
170 g softened butter
60 g unsweetened cocoa powder
100 g dark chocolate (70% cocoa)
4 eggs
1 tsp baking soda
for the topping:
150 g philadelphia cream cheese
250 g mascarpone
40 g icing sugar
2 tbsp whisky (we used a light glenmorangie, not peaty or smoky)
preheat the oven to 170°C (340 F).
heat 10 cl (100g) of guinness with the cocoa powder until it barely simmers, then add the chocolate and stir until it is melted. remove from heat and add the rest of the guiness.
in a bowl, whisk together butter and cane sugar until smooth. incorporate the eggs, one by one, then add the chocolate/guiness mixture, and finally add the sifted flour and baking soda. mix carefully.
butter and flour a round pan.
bake for 45-50 minutes (until a knife comes out clean). leave it to cool.
in a bowl, whisk together the cream cheese, the mascarpone, the icing sugar and the whisky until smooth.
spread unevenly the mixture on the top of the cake. refrigerate for at least 1 hour before serving.
piece of advice:
you can cut the cake in two, to end up with two cake layers. you can then spread a third of the frosting inside the cake, and the rest on top
this cake is even better the next day. with the frosting on top, you can keep it 2 days
