St. Patrick's Day: Cakes and Cupcake Ideas and Recipes

With Valentine’s Day over and the heart sprinkles, pink sugar crystals and red velvet cupcake ingredients put away, it’s time to push forward to the celebration of the Emerald Isles: Saint Patrick’s Day.

St. Patrick’s Day is all about celebrating the luck of the Irish for many but the Feast of Saint Patrick is much more than that.

It is a religious holiday and is filled to the brim with culture, named after Saint Patrick (which is considered to be the better known of the patron saints of Ireland according to reference.)

Ever since the seventeenth century the Catholic Church and Church of Ireland has acknowledged St. Patrick’s Day as an official feast day “Lá Fhéile Pádraig”

Now, centuries later it is common practice to celebrate Irish culture among not just the Irish people, but with Americans, Canadians, and many other cultures alike.

Like many holidays, St. Patrick’s Day brings family and friends together in celebration and happiness – and usually, that centers around food (especially in Western cultures).

So put on your green, polka dotted, rockabilly dress or a shamrock hat and see an Irish parade or other local festival and return home to bake up some yummy St. Patrick’s Day cakes and treats for your own party with your family and friends.

Cakes in general are for anyone; children, adults and seniors alike – and anyone can make them. Bake up some tasty treats for your kids and their school yard friends or for your company’s St. Patty’s Day party.

Cake Flavor

Let’s go green! As always, food coloring is a great way to bring the color of the holiday into your treats. Green food coloring added to cake batter can be perfect if you want to avoid actually adding something like minced spinach leaves to color your cake (which would not taste delicious). You can make great cakes flavored with mint, chocolate, and even… beer!

Try Betty Crocker’s gel food coloring in cream cheese icing to top a Green Velvet Cheesecake.

Here is a really tasty Bailey’s Irish Cream Cake that is perfect for those who want a kick in their treats for St. Patrick’s Day!

Do you want something tamer, or perhaps minty? Try a Chocolate Mint Swirl Cake from Betty Crocker or a Grasshopper Cake that is a perfect shade of green.

Filling

Since Valentine’s Day has come and gone, I have gotten better practice with filling cakes and cupcakes. I’m no Buddy Valastro or Rachel Ray, but I can put together a decent filling for my cupcakes: I still haven’t worked on cake filling yet.

Make sure you allow your cake cupcakes to cool off before you cut your hallow pit in the center to fill and save the extra cake intact to replace as a lid for your filling.

There are some delicious different fillings out there that can make your St. Patrick’s Day cupcakes or cakes complete, for example:

• Pistachio pudding, cake filling.
• Jam fillings in more ways than you can imagine: Raspberry, strawberry, peach…
• Lime
• Irish whiskey flavored chocolate cream
• Vanilla Buttercream or Vanilla Custard.

You can even coat your cake in a coffee after filling it vanilla buttercream – hello Irish Cream!

Add a scoop of ice-cream on the side of a slice of Guinness and Orange Moist Chocolate Cake to give yourself an extra treat – don’t forget to sprinkle chopped pecans over your ice cream!

Frosting

Have some fun with your Wilton and Duff cake decorating kits and use food coloring to make a dark green, lime green, or pastel green frosting to coat your new treats. Top it with a leprechaun edible cake topper and everyone will want a taste!

I recommend gel food coloring because liquid food coloring can make your frosting and creams bitter if you use too much. So if you’re aiming for a rich, dark green, shamrock color, think gels.

Here are just a few different decorations and tasty goodies that can top your Saint Patrick’s Day cakes:

• Colored sprinkles in green, white, brown, lime.
• Edible shamrock cake toppers
• Colored sugar crystals or sanding sugar: green, brown
• Chocolates
• Reese’s peanut butter cups
• Shamrock clovers
• Edible sugar pearls
• Chopped nuts: Pecans, walnuts, peanuts, cashews
• Moss green, edible glitter
• Coconut
• Caramels

…and much much more!

Try several different variations this year for St. Patrick’s Day cake or cupcakes with your loved ones on March 17^th that everyone will love.