This recipe is a true St. Patrick’s Day celebration at its core. The cake is a deliciously rich and moist chocolate cake with a heavy splash of Guinness throughout the batter, an espresso vanilla bean whipped cream center, and a Baileys Irish Buttercream swirl on top. Every bite is like a mini vacation.

top view of the finished, and frosted cupcakes with chocolate shavings on top

How To Make Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes With Baileys Irish Buttercream

This recipe is extremely easy to make and can be decorated to your liking. The cake batter is made in two separate bowls before being combined into a smooth, thin, batter. Let’s dive into what ingredients we’ll need!

Key Ingredients

Sour Cream – Sour cream adds moisture to our cupcakes which is always a shining quality in any good cake. The sour cream also reacts with the baking soda in this recipe. The acidity in the sour cream plays on the baking soda to create a lighter, airier cake.
Guinness – These cupcakes, which are perfect for St. Patrick’s Day, wouldn’t be complete without Guinness. This particular beer is known for its rich, malty, coffee & chocolate, flavor. These flavors complement the chocolate cake immensely. And like the sour cream, Guinness adds moisture to our cupcakes as well.
Cocoa Powder – This one might be self-explanatory, but this wouldn’t be a chocolate cupcake recipe without cocoa powder. Cocoa powder adds that deep and rich chocolate flavor to our dessert. We also need cocoa powder to help contribute to our dry ingredient structure and provide us with a strong balance of ingredients.
Eggs – Eggs are extremely important and in most cake recipes, provide structure, and protein, and the result of eggs in our cake is a tender, rich, moist, and perfectly structured cake.

holding up finished cupcake with chocolate shavings

Baking Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes With Baileys Irish Buttercream

The key to baking these cupcakes perfectly starts with the simple preparation of preheating our oven. Getting the oven prepared to the perfect temperature ahead of time ensures even baking throughout. The next key to baking these cupcakes comes to mixing the batter. It’s important to mix just until everything is combined. There is no need to continue the mixing process once everything is evenly distributed throughout the batter and will avoid the risk of an overworked batter.

Chocolate guinness cupcakes scooped evenly into cupcake pan before baking

chocolate guinness beer cupcakes after baking, sitting on a cooling rack

It’s important to fill each cupcake liner as close to the same amount as possible to ensure an even bake time for all of the cupcakes. Once the cupcakes are baked, transferring them to a cooling rack is imperative. Otherwise, the cupcakes will continue to sit in the hot pan they were baked in and keep on baking while sitting in there.

Espresso Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream

This filling is the perfect pairing with our chocolate cake and delicious Bailey’s frosting. However, if you want to omit this filling and instead use a regular whipped cream, a chocolate ganache, more baileys buttercream, whatever you wish! You can also keep these cupcakes as they are, without filling, then add the buttercream on top. Whatever you decide to do, they will still be so delicious!

Filling chocolate guinness cupcakes with espresso whipped cream

I hope that you enjoy this recipe as much as I did! If you recreate any of my recipes be sure to tag me on social media @thesqueakymixer :) I love to see how all of your beautiful desserts turn out!

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes With Baileys Irish Cream Icing

Recipe by Maddison Koutrouba – thesqueakymixer.com

4.4 from 27 votes

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Servings

24-30

servings

Cooking time

minutes

Cook Mode

Keep the screen of your device on.

Ingredients

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups cups granulated sugar
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs, room temperature
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup Guinness Beer
Espresso Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream Filling
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla bean paste (or vanilla extract)
1 tsp. espresso powder
Baileys Irish Buttercream
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
4 1/2 cups confectioner’s sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup Baileys Irish Cream (may need to add an additional 1-2 Tbsp.)
semi-sweet chocolate bar for shaving on top (optional)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line a cupcake pan with liners. Set aside.
In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream, vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla extract until smooth.
Add one cup of Guinness beer to the bowl of wet ingredients. Whisk to combine evenly.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients mixture and whisk until you have a nice, smooth batter with no lumps.
Scoop and fill your prepared cupcake pan filling each one 3/4 of the way full.
Bake for 12-15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out mostly clean. Transfer the cupcakes to a wire rack to cool completely before filling and decorating. Repeat these steps until all of the batter has been used up and all of your cupcakes are cooling.
Espresso Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream Filling
Use an electric mixer or stand mixer fit with the paddle attachment to whip all of the filling ingredients together on high speed until it has reached a cool whip consistency. This should take about 5 minutes. Transfer the whipped cream to a bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Store this in the fridge while we make the buttercream.
Baileys Irish Buttercream
To make the Irish buttercream, begin by using an electric mixer or stand mixer fit with the paddle attachment to cream together the butter and confectioner’s sugar on low speed.
Gradually add in the vanilla, salt, and Baileys Irish Cream a little at a time.
Continue to mix until there are no lumps. Be sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl as you mix. The buttercream should become smoother as you add the baileys. Mix until the buttercream is light, airy, and smooth and still holds its own shape.
Assembling & Decorating Our Cupcakes
Once the cupcakes have cooled completely, place the espresso whipped cream into a piping bag. One at a time, insert the tip of the piping bag in the center of each cupcake and gently squeeze the filling into each one. Don’t force too much filling in each cupcake or they will burst. If a lot of filling comes out the top you can simply use a butter knife or offset spatula to scrape off. This will make piping the Bailey’s frosting easier.
Once each cupcake has been filled, place the buttercream into a piping bag fit with a large star tip. Pipe a swirl on top of each cupcake according to your frosting-to-cupcake ratio preference.
Top each frosted cupcake with chocolate by using a grater to grate chocolate on top of each one.