Sláinte!

Nancy pointed me in the direction of this recipe a couple of months ago, and I thought that there was no better occasion to make Irish Car Bomb cupcakes St. Patrick's Day (well, the week of, anyway). Wheee, these have a lot of alcohol in them. The cake is extraordinarily moist and delicious, much better than previous Guinness cupcake recipes that I have tried. My ganache turned out very very strong (I admit to spilling a little bit of extra whiskey in there, ooops!), and I halved the recipe for that and was plenty. I also got tired of waiting for it to cool & thicken, so I added cocoa powder and it was perfect. I changed the frosting to a cream cheese based one, and now I have adjusted it to leave out 1 T. of Bailey's which would make it just right.

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes

Makes 24

Guinness Chocolate Cupcakes
1 cup stout (such as Guinness)
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch-process)
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sour cream

Ganache Filling
4 oz. bittersweet chocolate
2/3 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons butter, room temperature
1 to 2 teaspoons Irish whiskey (optional)

Baileys Frosting
1 8 oz. pkg of cream cheese, room temperature
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 C. confectioners sugar
3 tablespoons Baileys

Make the cupcakes:

• Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 24 cupcake cups with liners.
• Bring 1 cup stout and 1 cup butter to simmer in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.
• Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and 3/4 teaspoon salt in large bowl to blend.
  
• Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined.
  
• Divide batter among cupcake liners, filling them 2/3 to 3/4 of the way. Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, rotating them once front to back if your oven bakes unevenly, about 20-25 minutes. Cool cupcakes on a rack completely.

Make the filling:

• Chop the chocolate and transfer it to a heatproof bowl. Heat the cream until simmering and pour it over the chocolate. Let it sit for one minute and then stir until smooth. (If this has not sufficiently melted the chocolate, you can return it to a double-boiler to gently melt what remains. 20 seconds in the microwave, watching carefully, will also work.)
• Add the butter and whiskey and stir until combined.
• Let cool. I whisked in about 1/3cup of cocoa powder to thicken it up which worked very well.

Fill the cupcakes:

• Cut centers out of the cupcakes using a round cookie cutter, an apple corer, or a knife. I used a knife. You want to go most of the way down the cupcake but not cut through the bottom — aim for 2/3 of the way.
  
• Put the ganache into a piping bag with a wide tip and fill the holes in each cupcake to the top.
  

Make the frosting:

• Whip the butter and cream cheese in the bowl of an electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, for several minutes. You want to get it very light and fluffy. Slowly add the powdered sugar, a few tablespoons at a time.
• When the frosting looks thick enough to spread, drizzle in the Baileys (or milk) and whip it until combined. If this has made the frosting too thin (it shouldn’t, but just in case) beat in another spoonful or two of powdered sugar.

Ice and decorate the cupcakes. Dust with cocoa powder.

Good to go - off to spread some Irish cheer!

Fighting Irish

St. Patrick's Day is kind of a non-holiday for me, something I don't celebrate and exists mostly in memories of the Chicago River colored green and Green Beer day in college. Last year at this time, I was in New York with my friend Bruce and we enjoyed a 2-hour lunch at Balthazar while green-clad and painted people descended on the city from the 5 boroughs and beyond. We made it back to Long Island just in time to avoid the hard-core revelers.

This year I found a recipe online that looked too good to pass up. So I celebrated at home, in front of the fire, with a bowl of this wonderful beef stew, and Gabriel Byrne's lovely brogue in my ear as I caught up on this week's "In Treatment" episodes.

This stew is inexpensive, easy to make, and delicious. I happened to have a large bottle of St. Peter's Cream Stout in the cupboard, so I was already off to a better-than-average, although not exactly Irish, start. The prep is pretty minimal, and the beer breaks down the meat to a beautiful tenderness - even the toughest cut would fare well. Total cooking time was about 2 1/2 hours, until the liquid began to thicken.

Since there is no starch such as potatoes in the stew, we had it with a few slices of whole-grain brown bread and unsalted butter, which was perfect.

Angst, a glass of stout, and some hearty food? I do believe I've caught a wee bit of Irish spirit.


Beef and Irish Stout Stew

• 2 lbs. lean beef stew meat
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided
  
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• salt & freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 1 pinch cayenne pepper
• 2 large onions, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 1/2 cups Irish stout beer
  
• 2 cups chopped carrot (my note: about 5 carrots)
• 1 sprig fresh thyme

- Toss the beef cubes with 1 tablesppon of the vegetable oil.
- In a separate boel, stir together the flour, salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. Dredge the beef in this to coat.
- Heat the remaining oil in a deep skillet or Dutch oven over med-high heat.
- Add the beef and brown on all sides.
- Add the onions and garlic.
- Stir the tomato paste in a small amount of water to dilute; pour into the pan and stir to blend. Reduce the heat to medium, cover, and cook for 5 mintues.
- Pour 1/2 cup of the beer into the pan, and as it begins to boil, scrape any bits of food from the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. This adds a lot of flavor to the broth.
- Pour in the rest of the beer, and add the carrots and thyme.
Cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 2-3 hours, stirring occasionally.

Magically Delicious