Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes - Happy St. Patrick's Day!

We celebrating St. Patrick's Day yesterday in the beautiful, clear-blue-sky, sunshiny weather, on a boat. Such perfect weather! We had a little barbecue, had a lot of fun, and I got to make cupcakes for the occasion. These were FANTASTIC! I'm always in the mood to bake cupcakes for people and this was my first time having a filled cupcake. These cupcakes have a Guinness chocolate cake base, filled with Jameson chocolate ganache, and topped with Bailey's buttercream. SO GOOD. SO SMOOTH. SO YOU MUST MAKE THIS NOW. Pretty sure my friends thought this was the best cupcake I have ever made.

This recipe easily made 12 cupcakes. I was afraid that there wasn't enough frosting, but there definitely was. Man that frosting is good.

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes

Recipe from Better With Sugar

Cupcake:
1/2 C Guinness Stout
1/2 C unsalted butter, chopped
1/4 C + 2 TBS unsweetened cocoa powder
1 C all purpose flour
1 C granulated sugar
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
1/3 C sour cream

Ganache Filling:
2/3 C semi sweet chocolate chips
1/3 C whipping cream (or heavy cream)
1 TBS butter, room temperature
1 tsp whiskey

Frosting:
1/2 C butter, room temperature
2-1/2 C icing sugar
3 TBS Irish Cream

Preaheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a cupcake tin with cupcake liners.

Make the cupcakes: Heat the Guinness and butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat until it's simmering, or the butter is melted and it just begins to bubble a bit.

Remove the pan from the heat, add the cocoa and whisk until it's smooth. Set aside to cool a bit.

In a separate bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt.

In another separate, large bowl, beat together the egg and sour cream.

Add the Guinness-chocolate mixture to the egg mixture, and beat just to combine.

Beat in the flour mixture.

Pour the batter into the prepared cupcake tin. Bake for 21-22 min, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let cool on a rack.

Make the ganache: Heat the cream until simmering over low-med heat, then pour it over the chocolate chips. Let it sit for a minute, then stir it until smooth using a rubber spatula.

Add the butter and whiskey and stir until smooth again. Let the ganache cool until it has thickened up a bit but it still soft enough to be piped or spooned.

Cut out the centers of the cupcakes. I do this using the big open end of my 1M decorating tip. You could also use a sharp knife to cut a hole, going about 2/3 of the way down the cupcake.

You can either pipe the ganache into the holes in the cupcakes using a piping bag, or just spoon the ganache in.

Make the frosting: Using an electric mixer, whip the butter on med-high speed for a couple minutes. Add about 1/3 of the icing sugar and 1 TBS Irish Cream, beat on low. Repeat until all of the icing sugar and Irish Cream is mixed into the butter. Whip the frosting on med-high for another couple of minutes.

** Store in the fridge