Happy National Chocolate Cupcake day! Cupcakes can be traced back to 1796 when there was a recipe notation of “a cake to be baked in small cups” written in American Cookery, by Amelia Simmons.  The earliest known documentation of the term cupcake was in 1828 in Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats in Eliza Leslie’s Receipts cookbook. In England, they were (and still are) called fairy cakes due to their diminutive size (they tend to be smaller than American cupcakes). Australians refer to them as patty cakes. Cupcakes have been popular for decades, but in the past few years have become especially trendy thanks to Americans’ thirst for nostalgia, and their appearance on Sex And The City. Cupcakes were originally baked in heavy pottery cups.  Today, some bakers still use individual ramekins, small coffee mugs, large teacups, or other small ovenproof pottery-type dishes for baking their cupcakes. Peaks and Pints celebrates the day in the only way we know how — chocolate craft beer. Happy Craft Beer Crosscut 10.18.18: A Flight of Chocolate Beer!

Craft Beer Crosscut 10.18.18: A Flight of Chocolate Beer

Young’s Double Chocolate Stout

5.2% ABV

Young’s Double Chocolate Stout’s thick, creamy head sticks to the glass, emitting cocoa powder and semi-sweet chocolate. A hint of hoppiness in the air reminds that it is very much a beer. Pale ale and Crystal malt, Chocolate malt, special blend of sugars, Fuggle and Goldings hops, real dark chocolate and chocolate essence are all utilized in creating this unique beer. Creamy chocolaty sweetness coats the tongue like liquid silk. The malty, chocolaty smoothness dives into roasted malt bitterness that tingles through the aftertaste: The chocolate’s truly the chip off the old stout.

Boulder Beer Shake Chocolate Porter

5.9% ABV, 39 IBU

Boulder Beer Company’s Shake Chocolate Porter (Boulder, Colorado) tastes like a chocolate shake with its rich chocolate aroma and velvety mouthfeel. This beer, which took home a gold medal in the Chocolate Beer category from the 2014 World Beer Cup, is brewed with five different grains, including chocolate wheat, and has added cacao nibs. It’s chocolaty, but the swallow’s still crisp and clean; milky chocolate notes connect with traditional porter roast and ride a cola-like mouthfeel all the way down.

Track 7 Nukin’ Futz

7.3% ABV, 20 IBU

Dec. 31, 2011, Track 7 Brewing Co. opened for business in Sacramento, California. It grew from 340 barrels of beer in its opening year to just under 1,200 barrels in 2013. That’s not surprising since 1,000 people showed up to the brewery’s opening day – causing a line out the door for three hours. Track 7’s messed with its Burnt Fog Smoked Porter recipe, dropping the smoked malt and adding peanut butter, chocolate and lactose sugar. The combination produced a creamy peanut butter cup of a beer fitting for National Chocolate Cupcake Day.

Icicle Brewing Dark Persuasion

6.5% ABV, 22 IBU

Icicle Brewing Co. sits in the Bavarian theme park known as the city of Leavenworth, which seems perhaps the most appropriate place for a brewery. Owner Oliver Brulotte, who has deep family roots in Washington’s hop farming history, basically launch the Wenatchee Valley’s craft-beer boom. The brewery draws their water from nearby Icicle Creek, a run-off from surrounded by numerous mountain ranges including the Stuart Range and Wenatchee Mountains. And, Icicle Brewing makes a liquid German chocolate cake, Dark Persuasion. Seriously, this stout tastes exactly like German chocolate brownie, with strong chocolate and coconut notes, a touch of vanilla and a smooth finish.

Rogue Double Chocolate Stout

8.8% ABV, 68 IBU

Rogue Double Chocolate Stout, which debuted for Valentine’s Day in 2001, is an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie and a chocolate truffle together in a bed that had been strewn with hops. Now imagine the imperial version. Rogue’s Double Chocolate smells like the inside of pain au chocolat thanks to ample bittersweet Dutch chocolate. Clocking in at 8.8 percent alcohol by volume and wearing a red 750ml casing, this 2010 World Beer Championships gold medal winner is definitely a one-beer buzz.