It’s St. Patrick’s Day and I’m not in college anymore. When I was a poor college student, drinking a Guinness instead of eating dinner sounded like a great idea. These days I’d rather eat my vegetables and go to bed early, so drinking whiskey and green beer all day sounds more like torture than a good time.

That’s why this amateur baker chose to make a cake instead of a cocktail! I found this delicious recipe for Chocolate Stout Cake from Closet Cooking – a blog created from another amateur chef with a kitchen the size of a closet. He used traditional Guinness in his recipe, but I decided to make it even more chocolatey and use Double Chocolate Stout. The result was a cake that was squish-your-fork-against-the-plate-for-crumbs moist and positively decadent! The Bailey’s Irish Cream frosting will have you licking the mixing bowl, I promise. Enjoy!

Ingredients:
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 cup stout
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoons salt
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sour cream

Directions:
Melt the butter in a sauce pan, remove from heat and let cool a bit. Mix in the stout and coca powder.  Mix the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt in a large bowl.  Mix the eggs and sour cream in another large bowl.  Mix the stout mixture into the egg mixture.  Mix the dry ingredients into the wet.

Pour the batter into one or two greased and parchment lined circular pans. Bake
in a preheated 350F oven until a toothpick pushed into the center comes
out clean. For a single pan, it should take about 40-50 minutes. For two
cake pans, it should take about 20-30 minutes.

Bailey’s Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1 cup confectioners sugar
3 tablespoons of Bailey’s Irish Cream

Directions:
Cream the cheese. Slowly mix in the confectioners sugar. Slowly mix in the Irish Cream. Frost the cake.

Our intern is Desiree Johnson, a recent journalism graduate and Texas native. The 26-year-old loves painting, her dachshund Munchie and using what she calls her “real, adult-sized kitchen.”