Stout cake with cream cheese and chocolate caramel

These gorgeous stout cakes from Pip Lacey are impossible to resist: tender, slightly chocolatey, and covered in lashings of cream and stout-infused caramel.

Ingredients

• 250 ml of stout, such as
• 250 g of unsalted butter
• 75 g of cocoa powder
• 400 g of caster sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tbsp of vanilla extract
• 150 ml of sour cream
• 275 g of plain flour
• 2.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 210 ml of stout, such as
• 100 g of light brown sugar
• 35 g of caster sugar
• 135 ml of double cream
• 20 g of dark chocolate
• 1 pinch of sea salt
• 40 ml of double cream
• 100 g of cream cheese
• 50 g of icing sugar
• 0.5 tsp cornflour

Steps

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4
2. First, make the stout cake. Melt the butter in the stout over a low heat, then remove from the heat. Transfer to a large bowl and add the cocoa powder and sugar. Whisk until combined
3. Beat together the eggs, vanilla essence and sour cream with an electric mixer in a separate bowl, and then add this to the stout mixture. Sift the flour and bicarb into the bowl, and then fold it in
4. Divide the batter between the 9 holes of the silicone mould, and bake for 13 minutes. Set aside to cool completely
5. To make the caramel, add the stout to a pan with both the sugars and bring to a simmer. Cook the stout until it's reduced by half, and then add the cream, chocolate and salt
6. Keep cooking and reducing the caramel until it has the texture of runny honey
7. To make the topping, mix all the ingredients together and then transfer it to a piping bag
8. To serve, pipe the cream cheese topping over the cakes and drizzle them with the stout caramel