Decadent Triple Chocolate Guinness Cake

Rich and Wonderful Modern Tradition...

Using Beer in cakes is great for adding a lovely deep richness and a mellow yeasty note to the sponge. It was traditional in Ireland to make Porter cake. Porter cake is a delicious fruit cake made with stout.

It didn't take long for people to work out that stout and chocolate are a combination made in heaven. With that being the case, and the roots of a good stout cake resting in Ireland it seems totally appropriate to make a delicious chocolate Guinness cake for St.Patrick's Day. What really adds to the effect is the dark sponge and white topping makes it look a little like a pint of Guinness.

This cake is the polar opposite of light and delicate and is absolutely not diet-friendly in any stretch of the imagination... But that's OK, who doesn't love treating themselves?

• Makes 1 12-inch cake

• Prep - 30 mins

• Cooking - 60 mins

Let's Get The Ingredients...

For the cake:

• 450g Self-Raising Flour
• 1 Tablespoon Baking Soda (Bicarb)
• 250g Salted Butter plus extra for greasing
• 250ml Guinness (or any stout really)
• 2 large eggs
• 150g Cocoa Powder
• 1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
• 450g Caster Sugar
• 150g Milk Chocolate Chips
• 150g Dark Chocolate
• 150g Thick Yoghurt

For the creams:

• 400g Cream Cheese (let this warm to room temp)
• 300g Icing Sugar
• 200ml Double Cream
• 150g Dark Chocolate
• 150g White Chocolate
• 1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
• 2 Tablespoons Cocoa Powder 

Let's Bake...

For this cake, we will need to start with the topping and creams first. This is because it needs to be chilled to make them set. When I cooked this cake to take pictures for this blog I actually didn't chill them long enough and the cake tried to collapse and I couldn't get a good slice pic to show you the layers. Since then, I chilled the cake as a whole overnight and sliced into it and got a quick snap on my phone. Here is the difference:

The left one was collapsing as it was too warm still. The right-hand one was after the creams had set correctly!

The Creams:

So start by putting the cream cheese into your mixer bowl with the whisk attachment on and start beating for about 3 or 4 minutes to soften and re-combine any excess whey liquid. Pop in the icing sugar and continue to whisk until all combined. Add the double cream and whisk on the lowest setting until the cream has combined. You do not want to start whipping this just yet. 

Remove half the mixture from the mixer and set aside. 

Take 135g of the white chocolate and melt in the microwave with short 30 second bursts and stirring to make sure you do not burn it. You will be mixing the chocolate as an ingredient so no need to monitor temperature or temper. 

Pour the melted white chocolate and the vanilla extract into the mixing bowl with the half of the mixture not set aside. Whisk on high speed until light and fluffy put into a separate bowl and place in the fridge.

The half you set aside you now need to put into the mixing bowl again. Add the cocoa powder and then melt 135g of the dark chocolate like you did with the white chocolate above and, once melted, pour into the mix and whisk on high speed until light and fluffy.

Spoon into another bowl and put in the fridge.

The Sponge:

Preheat your oven to 180°C then grease and line 2 12-inch springform baking tins (you can do it as one cake and cut it in half later once cooled if needed... I actually lost one of my tins so I had to do this for cake in the picture)

Pour the Guinness and butter into a pan and start heating on low heat. Once the butter is melted into the Guinness, add the cocoa powder, caster sugar, and vanilla extract. Whisk the mixture together by hand in the pan on low heat until it is all combined and leave on the side to cool slightly.

Change the whisk for your beater paddle on your mixer and put the self-raising flour, baking soda, yoghurt and eggs into your mixing bowl. Melt the dark chocolate and add to the bowl.

Pour the Guinness, butter and sugar mix from the pan, into the mixing bowl and mix on medium speed until it you have a smooth batter.

Now add the milk chocolate chips and mix through the batter.

Pour into the tins and bake in the centre of the oven. Check on it after 45 minutes by putting a cake spike or skewer through the middle to the bottom of the tin and making sure it comes out clean when you pull it out.

Once cooked, cool completely on a wire rack.

Take one of the sponges and spread your dark chocolate cream on top, making sure it's still chilled straight from the fridge. Do the same using the white chocolate cream on the over the sponge and stack this one on top of the dark chocolate cream.

Remember the 15g of white choc and 15g of dark chocolate leftover from the cream making stage? grate this with a zester and sprinkle on top to decorate. I also took some extra chocolate and placed the blade of a sharp knife at 90 degrees to the surface and scraped some nice thin curls of chocolate to put on top too.

Serve with a dark roast coffee, or if you're in the mood, a lovely creamy chilled pint of Guinness.