Father's Day Part Deux

I read over the previous post I can't help but wonder what kind of family portrait I am painting for my readers - the whole tone seems somewhat negative and the truth is, I love my weird family - we put the 'fun' in 'dysfunctional' - and I love corporate-sponsored gratuitous ift giving occassions.

So this is a second attempt at a Father's Day post - with cupcakes and all.

All dads like Guinness. In fact I'd go so far as to say that noone but dads like Guinness. Like James May and Saturday afternoons spent 'pottering', Guinness is a daddio pre-req. Both of my dads like Guinness and all my grandads too. David is also a fan - though he drank it long before he was a dada - and come to think of it little V is quite fond of licking the froth of the top of a pint too - remember that Boddington's advert with Melanie Sykes?

I had bookmarked some Guinness baking recipes for St Patricks Day but what with moving house I forgot all about it. So Guinness cake for Father's Day was born. Only a whole cake just doesn't seem right, cupcakes are much more... festive.

This is a Nigella recipe, from 'Feast' I think, only I was a bit nervous about jigging round with it to make a cupcake version (since reading Delia's 'How to Cook' I am religiously following recipes with much better results than ever before) - enter Patent and the Pantry a delicious eye-candy food blog that reminds me a lot of the domestic goddess herself - something about the scarlet peeptoes in the masthead pushes all my buttons.

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes

250 ml Guinness

110g unsalted butter, cut into chunks

170g unsweetened cocoa powder

450g granulated sugar

175 ml sour cream

2 large eggs, room temperature

1 tbsp vanilla extract

200g all-purpose flour

2½tsp baking soda

Icing:

250 g cream cheese

100g icing sugar

2 tbsp whipping cream

Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C). Line two 12-cup muffin pans with paper liners.

Pour the Guinness into a large saucepan, add butter and heat at medium-low until melted. Whisk in the cocoa powder and sugar, then remove from heat. In a small bowl, beat together the sour cream, eggs and vanilla.

Pour into the slightly cooled Guinness-butter mixture. Whisk in the flour and baking soda.

Spoon batter into cupcake pan, so each liner is about three-quarters full. Bake for 15 to 18 minutes or until a tester comes out clean. Let cool in the pan, then remove to a rack to cool completely.

Once completely cooled, make the icing.

Beat cream cheese and icing sugar until smooth. Add the whipping cream and beat again until it is thoroughly mixed and spreadable. Add more cream if you want a thinner icing. Spread onto cooled cupcakes.

(my picture is a bit blurry and dark due to my black kitchen and the fact that I do all my baking at 10pm when Vin is sleeping... for better pics check out Patent and the Pantry)

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