St. Pat's Day = Chocolate Stout Cupcakes

Irish... irish..... irish................... soda bread cupcake? blech..... hmmmm....
Green cupcake? yuck...... mint? nah, it's been done....

And then i stumbled upon Big City, Little Kitchen's Chocolate Stout cupcakes. Perfection!
I whipped them up this morning (went into work late... hehe), and mmmmm the smell was wondrous! Melting the butter with Guinness, the aroma was gorgeous! The recipe made 23 cupcakes. I made a quick half recipe of Martha's brown sugar buttercream icing, and decided to ice them by hand (the look inspired by the 'foam' at the top of a beer), and roll the edges in green and white sanding sugar. They turned out pretty well, although i had to take a crappy picture at work (i was in a huge rush this morning):
Everyone really enjoyed them! The texture was quite light, and had a good depth of flavor due to the Guinness. I didn't put a huge amount of icing, but i think it was a good ratio. I think i would fill the muffin cups a little more next time (I used 1/4 cup in each), as i would like them to form a dome that spilled just slightly beyond the edge of the liner.
I would definitely use this chocolate cupcake recipe as my 'standard' chocolate recipe. Yum!