Guinness Loaf Cake

A rich, chocolatey and wonderfully moist Guinness loaf cake topped with a smooth vanilla cream cheese frosting and plenty of chocolate shavings.

If you love a rich and easy to bake chocolate cake, this Guinness loaf cake is a delicious recipe to pick. The combination of the Guinness, brown sugar and cocoa powder gives a beautifully deep flavour that is balanced so well with a slathering of a vanilla bean flecked cream cheese frosting.

Notes from The Patisserie

This recipe is basically the easy loaf cake version of my Guinness cake that has been on my blog for years, and I am not mad about it. It’s a chocolate Guinness cake in loaf form making it easy to make, easy to decorate, and perfect for all sorts of celebrations (including St Patrick’s Day of course) or just because you fancy making something chocolate themed.

Guinness and chocolate are one of those combinations that just work together. Adding a stout drink to a chocolate cake may sound unusual if you haven’t tried it yet, but honestly, trust the process. It’s light in texture still, but also incredibly moist and addictive to eat.

I purposely kept this recipe simple by using the same 2lb loaf tin that I use for all my loaf cakes, and it made it so easy as there is no awkward assembly, no piping to decorate, and I love that.

Ingredient notes + tips

The main recipe can be found in the recipe card below, but here are some useful tips or swaps you might want to know about before you bake the cake:

• Butter – I would recommend using a block butter, or a baking spread – some margarines have a higher oil content but generally that should be fine for the sponge cake.
• Sugar – I use light brown soft sugar because of the flavour and texture it brings to the cake – you can swap this for caster sugar, or even golden caster sugar. Dark brown soft sugar will make a deeper treacle flavour
• Vanilla – optional, but recommend. I use a good quality vanilla extract, or vanilla bean paste – NEVER essence.
• Eggs – I use medium eggs in all of my bakes, but you can use 2 large eggs + one yolk if thats what you have.
• Guinness – I use the standard Guinness cans – you only need 150ml so the rest can be drunk to not waste it!!
• Cocoa – I would always recommend a super strong cocoa powder if you can use one. I use a 100% cocoa powder as it provides the best flavour, but I would recommend avoiding a hot chocolate powder as they do not carry a strong chocolate flavour in baking.
• Flour – I used self raising flour as I always have it in the cupboard, but you can use a plain or all purpose flour, with 2tsps of baking powder whisked in before using in the mixture.
• Milk – I would highly recommend using a full-fat milk so that the mixture doesn’t split.

Making a thick cream cheese frosting

Unfortunately, it’s notoriously hard to make cream cheese frosting in the UK where I live. We do not get block cream cheese like some countries do (use that if you can buy it!!) so sometimes it can go a little runny.

I have developed a thick and pipeable cream cheese frosting that has a slightly different base to the normal ones you see online, and I think thats the why it works. Equal parts block unsalted butter (NEVER a spread or margarine) and icing sugar (powdered sugar), mixed together until combined. Make sure the butter is at room temperature so you can mix it until smooth – lumpy butter will cause problems.

Mix in vanilla if using, and then the full-fat soft cream cheese. Some brands carry more water in their container, so make sure to drain that off. Don’t over mix as this can slacken it! Find more information on this on my separate blog post.

Swaps and changes

Alcohol – Now, if you want to make this cake but you don’t want to use alcohol for any reason, there are some simple swaps you can do to make this possible.

Generally, the swap for a regular Guinness would either be the 0% version that is now in the market, or full-fat Coca Cola. They straight swap (so still 150ml) so that it can be suitable for all. The alcohol content does disappear through baking, but it’s totally fine if you still want to swap it.

Gluten – This recipe should work with a simple swap to gluten free flour as well – add 0.5tsp xanthan gum if your flour doesn’t already contain it.

Dairy – The sponge itself is very simple to switch to dairy free (make sure to check all ingredients but simple swaps work!) but the frosting can suffer a little sometimes when using dairy free swaps. If you don’t want a runny frosting, it may be best to swap to a simple dairy free buttercream instead.

Storage and Freezing

The cake is delicious and can last for 4-5 days without the topping on top. Once you have decorated the cake with cream cheese frosting, it will last for 2-3 days, and must be stored in the fridge due to cream cheese.

If you want to freeze the cake, it can freeze with or without the topping, for 3+ months. Thaw in the fridge for best results!