Guinness Cupcakes with Baileys Irish Creme Icing

We celebrated my husband's birthday last week.  Interestingly enough the week before that I had to ask him if we were turning 28 or 29... when exactly do you stop remembering how old you are!? Anyway, after he reminded me that we were 28 and turning 29 I was ready to plan a celebration.  With the move and all the hoopla, we decided on practical gifts this year.  For his birthday (and because we need one) he picked out a grill.  It's a pretty nice grill, too! 

Breaking in the Grill

His birthday was on a weekday, which was not the most fun, but I made him a delicious dinner and set out to make a "surprise birthday dessert"- Guinness Cupcakes with Baileys Icing!  He loves Guinness so I knew he'd want to try these. I found a bunch of pictures of these cupcakes on Pinterest but couldn't find the actual link.  Eventually I did find a recipe on the interweb, but I adapted it to what I thought would fit him a little better.  Feel free to play around with the ingredients too :)

Ingredients for Cupcakes:
2 sticks of unsalted butter
1 cup Guinness (I used almost one whole bottle because I wanted to be able to taste it)
3/4 cup cocoa powder
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsb baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla

- Melt butter on medium heat, then mix in Guinness
- Add cocoa powder, whisk, and let cool slightly
- Mix together flour, sugar, baking soda and salt
- Beat eggs and sour cream until mixed, add vanilla
- Add Guinness mixture to egg mixture
- Add flower mixture to Guinness and egg mixture
- Pour batter into cupcake pan, about 3/4 full

Bake on 350 for 15-17 min. Makes 20-24 cupcakes 

Then we waited for them to bake...

 Bailey's Icing:

- Mix one container cream cheese frosting with enough baileys to taste. You can google to find a recipe from scratch, but this was my short cut- and Nick commented on how he liked the taste. 

Ready to Eat!