Beer cake facts for kids

A chocolate bundt cake made with stout beer

Cake batter with stout beer, being put into pans

Cupcakes made with Guinness dry stout beer

Beer cake is a type of cake that uses beer as one of its main ingredients. It also includes other things you would normally find in a cake. Chocolate cakes sometimes use dark beers like stout or chocolate stout. Some gingerbread cakes also include beer in their recipes. In India, the Rabha tribe makes a special type of beer cake from rice. They use it to create rice beer and a traditional drink called fotika. There are also other kinds of beer cakes, like root beer cake.

What is Beer Cake?

The type of beer used in a beer cake can give the cake a slightly yeasty flavor. Even the icing on a beer cake can be made with beer as a main ingredient. Dark beers like stout and chocolate stout are often used in chocolate beer cakes.

You can also add fruit to beer cakes, like blueberries. One way to do this is to mash the fruit in a glass, then add beer to it. This mixture is then used in the cake's batter. Fruit can also be used to decorate the cake after it's baked.

Bolo de Cerveja

In countries like Brazil and Portugal, beer cake is often called "Bolo de cerveja." This simply means "beer cake" in their language.

Gingerbread Beer Cake

Some gingerbread cakes are made with beer. The beer can make the cake taste richer and more flavorful. Using a dark beer in gingerbread cakes can make the spices in the cake taste even better. However, using the wrong type of beer can make a gingerbread cake less tasty. For example, a light beer like a lager might make the cake bitter. A very heavy beer like a stout might make the cake too dense.

Rice-Beer Cake

The Rabha tribe in the Goalpara district of Assam, India, makes a special rice-beer cake. They call it bakhor, phap, or surachi. This cake is used to make a traditional rice beer called choko. This choko can then be made into a stronger traditional drink called fotika.

To make the rice-beer cake, rice is ground into a paste. This paste is mixed with certain plants, cooked rice, and some previously made rice-beer cake. A special bamboo net, called a janthi, is placed inside a pot called a jonga. The rice-beer cake mixture is placed in the jonga, around the janthi. The pot is then sealed tightly with a banana leaf that has been warmed by fire. The mixture then sits to ferment.

After some time, the liquid inside the janthi becomes a drinkable rice beer. To make the fotika drink, more rice cake and water are added to the liquid in the janthi. It then sits for more time. After this, the mixture is put through a special process to create the stronger fotika drink.

Root Beer Cake

Root beer cake is a type of beer cake that uses root beer as a main ingredient. Root beer can be made without alcohol or with a small amount of alcohol.

Porter Cake

Porter cake is a traditional Irish cake. Some people say it is linked to St. Patrick's Day. It is a fruit cake that is traditionally made using a type of beer called Porter. However, dark beers like Guinness stout can also be used instead.