Chocolate Stout Cake with Carmel Filling and Irish Cream Frosting

A while back, I made chocolate stout cupcakes using a similar recipe and they were a hit, so I thought I'd try it as a cake for a BBQ tonight.

Cake
1 cup stout (such as Guinness)
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3/4 cups unsweetened cocoa powder
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
½ Tbsp baking soda
¾ tsp salt
2 large eggs
2/3 cups vanilla Greek yogurt

Caramel Filling:
1 stick butter

Click to see savings1 cup sugar
Click to see savings1 Tbsp corn syrup
1/3 cup whipping cream

Irish Cream Frosting:
1/2 cup butter, softened

3 cups powdered sugar, or more as needed
3 Tbsp Irish cream liqueur (such as Baileys®), or more to taste

For Cake:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter two 8-inch cake pans with 2-inch-high sides. Line with parchment paper. Butter paper. Over med-high heat in a saucepan, bring stout and butter to simmer. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt to blend. In another large bowl, using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined. Divide batter equally between prepared pans.

Bake cakes until tester inserted into center of cakes comes out clean, about 35 minutes. Transfer cakes to rack; cool 10 minutes. Turn cakes out onto rack and cool completely.

For Filling:

In a saucepan over medium heat, melt butter. Add sugar and corn syrup, stirring constantly for 6 to 8 minutes or until mixture turns a deep caramel color. Gradually add cream, stirring constantly for 1 to 2 minutes or until smooth. Remove from heat, and let cool. Chill 2 hours or until thickened and spreading consistency.

For Frosting:
In a bowl with an electric mixer, whip butter until fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes.

Set mixer to low speed and slowly beat in confectioners' sugar, 1 cup at a time, until frosting is smooth and spreadable. Beat in the Irish cream liqueur; adjust thickness of frosting with more confectioners' sugar if needed.

To Assemble:

Once cake has cooled and filling and frosting have chilled, assemble cake. Place one cake on a plate as bottom layer, spread with caramel filling and top with second cake. Trim sides of cake and remove any extra edges to make both top and bottom cakes line up. (Save trimmed cake bits for decorating.) Gently frost cake with Irish cream frosting. Crumble trimmed cake bits and decorate edges of the finished cake.

 

Chill cake until ready to serve.
 

Helpful Tips:
· Make everything the night before and assemble the next day. This way you don’t have to wait for things to cool down before assembling.
· It’s tricky to frost the cake once the cake edges are trimmed since the crumbs stick to the spatula. Use a thick layer of frosting to help prevent this. This is the reason why I decorated using the crumbs.