I’m actually Irish, not just St. Patrick’s Day Irish. That said, it was instinctual how to celebrate this unifying holiday: with Ireland’s sweet nectar -- Guinness and Bailey’s.
Deciding how to combine these two ingredients (besides in my mouth) was easy. I settled on a modified crowd favorite: Chocolate Guinness mini-cupcakes with Bailey’s frosting. Oh yeah – I went there. I had previously made an even boozier concoction with a layer of Jameson chocolate ganache for Abbas’ birthday, so I knew this was an intoxicating combination. You can find the recipe for the Guinness cake here and Bailey's frosting here. I made a few modifications below though.
So after a quick trip to my nearest liquor store for a lone bottle of Guinness and a nip of Bailey’s I was off!
The recipe is very easy to put together (even after a few sips of the sauce) so making the batter didn’t take much time. As with the last month’s cookies, the real devotion takes place in the baking process. Thankfully, the mini cupcake pan cooks many a mini cupcake at a time. On the other hand, it takes very little batter to fill a mini cupcake, so all in all, I think it would have been faster to make regular cupcakes… but the mini ones are just so cute! (insert that's what she said joke here)
I also discovered a magical setting unique to my convection oven: abstract. I must have switched that on after pre-heating to 350 degrees because the first few batches came out like small modern art sculptures. Seriously, you couldn’t get your ovens to do this if you tried! After a few experiments, I found that rotating the pan produced more normal, sober-looking cupcakes.
The Bailey’s Icing was pretty easy to make, but I ended up doubling the amount Bailey’s to make it a little more flavorful and for a better consistency for piping out of a gallon ziplock bag (only the finest at chez Hannah). I also, obviously, left out the green sprinkles. Buy hey, dance what you feel.
And there you have it! One organic-clover-garnish-that-I-found-in-Tompkins-Park-and-triple-washed-with-soap-and-water-because-it-was-from-Tompkins-Square-Park later you have what I can only assume is an authentic Irish dessert, made with the country’s finest exports (minus Conan O'Brien who last time I checked you couldn't make into a cupcake).
And there you have it! One organic-clover-garnish-that-I-found-in-Tompkins-Park-and-triple-washed-with-soap-and-water-because-it-was-from-Tompkins-Square-Park later you have what I can only assume is an authentic Irish dessert, made with the country’s finest exports (minus Conan O'Brien who last time I checked you couldn't make into a cupcake).
