Tags: Chocolate Holiday Party Planning Sweet Tooth
St. Patrick’s Day is a sacred holiday in my family. It’s not a holiday we casually celebrate with cute clover socks and a green shirt…NO…it’s practically a religion for us! My mom does not mess around when it comes to St. Patrick’s Day. She is very proud of her half Irish heritage. For as long as I can remember she has gone the whole mile—she prepares a full corned beef meal, decorates her house within an inch of its life, wears green from head to toe, and believes in leprechauns (for the grandkids, of course). It’s a tradition I’ve inherited and hope my boys will continue in the future.
While I LOVE a well-prepared corned beef sandwich, dessert is my favorite part of St. Patrick’s Day—my favorite part of ANY meal, if I’m honest. But for some reason, St. Patrick’s Day got robbed in the dessert category. Most holidays have some sort of dessert attached to them; yet, when you think of St. Patrick’s Day, no specific dessert comes to mind. That’s just sad. I’ve decided to change the narrative.
Introducing the perfect St. Patrick’s Day dessert:
Chocolate Velvet Cupcakes with Bailey’s Irish Buttercream.
It’s perfect. You can’t go wrong with velvet cupcakes and while cream cheese frosting is typical for velvets, I’ve decided to go “Irish” and add a little alcohol to the mix. The deliciousness of the velvet cupcakes pairs perfectly with the creamy goodness of the buttercream. It’s a delight.
Now, because I’ve got two little ones eating these cupcakes, I prefer to cook out the alcohol. I know, I know, you can never cook out 100% of any alcohol, but it makes me feel better knowing the percentage is negligible by the time it hits their plates. It’s a personal preference.
Another personal preference is forgoing the food coloring. You could easily make these bad boys more “Irish” by adding green food coloring, but I try to avoid food coloring when I can.
**I have a super funny story about my brother-in-law and red velvet cupcakes, but I’ll spare him and not share it** haha oh man…good times
Anyway…try them out this year, see if they make the cut for “official cupcake of St. Patrick’s Day” and let me know what you think.
CHOCOLATE VELVET CUPCAKES:
(Makes 24 cupcakes)
3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
3 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 ½ tsp baking soda
1 ½ tsp salt
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
2 cups vegetable oil
1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
1 ½ cups buttermilk
1 ½ tsp white vinegar
Preheat oven to 350°
Sift dry ingredients—flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt—into large bowl. Set aside.
In the bowl of your stand mixer, mix together sugar and eggs on medium speed until ribbons form—about 5 minutes. With mixer running, add oil and vanilla until just blended.
In a small bowl, pour buttermilk and add vinegar. This is an important step! Something happens when you combine buttermilk and vinegar and that reaction is important to the texture of your cupcakes (look at that…I’m giving you a science lesson in this post too!)
With your mixer on low add ½ of the dry mixture to the sugar/egg mixture followed by ½ of the buttermilk mixture. Repeat with final halves of both mixtures. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and mix until just combined. You don’t want to overmix.
Fill cupcake liners to the top (they don’t rise much) and bake 20-25 minutes—until inserted toothpick comes out clean. Let cool in pan 10 minutes and cool completely on cooling rack before frosting.
BAILEY’S IRISH BUTTERCREAM
(Makes enough for 24 cupcakes)
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
2 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar
½ tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
½ cup Bailey’s Irish Cream liqueur (cooked down from 1 cup)
In small sauce pan over medium heat reduce Bailey’s down to ¼ cup. Remove from heat and let come to room temperature.
In the bowl of your electric mixer (fitted with whisk attachment) cream butter until smooth—about 5 minutes. Add sugar one cup at a time (slowly and carefully or your kitchen will be covered in a layer of confectioners’ sugar—speaking from experience) scrape down sides of bowl and beat well after each addition. Add salt, vanilla and reduced liqueur. Beat until light and fluffy.
