There are brownies… and then there are these brownies. Rich, fudgy, and infused with a whole cup of Guinness Extra Stout, this recipe is basically the dessert equivalent of a cozy Irish pub. Only with more chocolate. And fewer drunk uncles.

Make these for a St. Patrick’s Day party and watch grown adults hover near the dessert table like sneaky leprechauns guarding gold. The Guinness gives the brownies this incredible depth—almost like malted dark chocolate with just a whisper of bitterness to balance out the sweet. No one will guess there is beer in them… they’ll just know they taste really freaking good!

These brownies are made with three types of chocolate (bittersweet, white, and semisweet chips) because moderation is for salads. The batter comes together surprisingly fast, and you can customize them based on your preferred brownie texture—whether you’re team fudgy, chewy, or cakey.

Best of all? These freeze like champs, so you can totally make them ahead for a party—or hide a few in the back of the freezer for when future-you needs a treat and a high five.

ingredients

Let’s bake some chocolate magic, shall we, by first looking at the ingredients for these brownies.

guinness extra stout

This is the soul of the brownies. Guinness adds depth and richness with its roasted malt, slight bitterness, and toasty notes—think chocolate, coffee, and dark caramel. Let it come to room temp and pour gently to avoid foam (we want 8 oz of liquid, not froth). Don’t worry—most of the alcohol bakes off, leaving behind bold flavor.

Using stout in baking isn’t just a trendy modern twist—it’s a centuries-old tradition rooted in European kitchens. Long before beer was ever added to Instagram-worthy cakes, home bakers were stirring dark, malty ales into breads and fruit cakes to add depth, moisture, and a hint of fermentation-driven lift.

In Ireland, Guinness became the go-to stout of choice—not just because it was iconic and widely available, but because of its unmistakable flavor. With notes of roasted barley, cocoa, coffee, and caramel, it brought a complexity that turned simple bakes into something special. It didn’t take long for bakers to realize that Guinness wasn’t just good with dessert—it was incredible in it.

The idea of Guinness cake likely evolved from older Irish bakes like fruit loaves and tea breads, where stout was already being used to enhance richness and balance sweet ingredients. Over time, the addition of stout expanded from fruit-heavy loaves into the world of chocolate cakes, cupcakes, and yes—brownies.

There’s no single baker to credit with this now-beloved combo. Like most great recipes, it’s the result of gradual innovation, kitchen experimentation, and the irresistible marriage of dark beer and dark chocolate.

So when we say these brownies have “a bit of history baked in,” we’re not kidding. They’re rich in flavor and folklore.

let’s talk chocolate: the fab four of flavor

This brownie recipe leans hard into chocolate—in the best possible way. We’re not just tossing in a handful of chips and calling it a day. Nope. We’re layering four different types of chocolate ingredients, each one playing a specific role to create rich, complex, and straight-up craveable results.

bittersweet chocolate

This is the backbone of your brownie. With its high cocoa content (usually 70% or more), bittersweet chocolate adds bold, intense chocolate flavor and gives the batter that shiny, luxurious texture we all crave in a fudgy brownie.

white chocolate chips

White chocolate gets a bad rap, but in this case it’s not trying to be the star—it’s the supporting actor who steals the show. Melting it into the base adds creaminess and mellow sweetness that balances the dark bitterness of both the chocolate and the stout.

unsweetened cocoa powder

This is your flavor amplifier. While the melted chocolate brings richness and body, cocoa powder is the flavor booster. It deepens the overall chocolate intensity and adds that slightly bitter, roasty edge that makes brownies taste like… well, brownies — not just chocolate cake squares. (see additional note below)

semi-sweet chocolate chips

These are the little bursts of joy in each bite. Sprinkled just before baking, semisweet chips melt into pockets of gooey goodness and bring visual flair to the finished brownie. Use chips, chunks, or chopped bar chocolate—whatever you’ve got on hand.

why use all four?

Because each one does something different: cocoa for punch, bittersweet for depth, white for balance, and semisweet for texture. Together they create brownies with dimension, personality, and serious chocolate cred.

butter + sugar = baking alchemy

Before the eggs, the chocolate, or even the Guinness makes an appearance, there’s one little ritual that kicks off a great brownie: creaming the butter and sugar. Even though we’re not going for a super fluffy, airy texture here (this isn’t cake, after all), this step still matters.

So what’s actually happening when you cream butter and sugar together? You’re forcing tiny air pockets into the fat. That gives your final brownies just enough lightness to avoid being bricks, while still keeping that dense, fudgy interior. You’re also starting the process of dissolving the sugar, which helps create that coveted shiny, crackly brownie top (aka the holy grail of brownie texture).

In this recipe, we melt some chocolate and butter together — but when we beat the eggs and sugar separately until light and fluffy, we’re mimicking that same creaming effect. It’s all about building a foundation for structure and texture. And yeah… it’s science.

TL;DR: Don’t rush it. A few extra minutes of mixing here gives you brownies that are chewy, shiny-topped, and downright magical.

eggs

Eggs bring structure and moisture. Letting them come to room temp helps them incorporate better into the batter and helps prevent the chocolate from seizing when they meet.

2025 note: I know, I know. The price of eggs is wild these days; we almost need a “number of eggs required” rating system for recipes. But you only need two… and honestly, these brownies are worth the investment. The kids can always get a job to help pay for college, right? 🙄

all-purpose flour

Just enough to hold it all together, but not so much that we lose that luscious fudgy texture. Be gentle when mixing — overmixing flour is how you accidentally invent chocolate rubber.

my not-so-secret flour ritual

When I’m not being smart and weighing my flour (which, let’s be honest, is most of the time), I use a little measuring trick that helps keep things consistent.

First, I take a clean whisk and give the flour in my storage container a brisk stir—not enough to send clouds flying everywhere, just enough to break up clumps and gently aerate it. Then I use a lightweight scoop (mine’s a repurposed Gatorade powder scoop—waste not, want not!) to lightly spoon the flour into my measuring cup. No packing, no digging, no dunking the whole cup in like I’m on a flour treasure hunt.

It’s a simple step, but it helps prevent over-measuring and gives me more reliable bakes—without hauling out the kitchen scale every time.

But seriously, if you want to take your baking (or any cooking for that matter), weighing is the gold standard. Just do it; your brownies will thank you!

salt

A little salt is the secret to all good chocolate desserts. It wakes up the flavor and balances the sweetness.

why use cocoa powder and chocolate?

it’s all about layering flavor. Cocoa powder is unsweetened, dry, and pure chocolate essence. It gives you that deep cocoal punch without extra fat or sugar. Think of it as the espresso shot that sharpens everything else.

Cocoa powder is made by pressing the cocoa butter out of chocolate liquor (not the boozy kind — sorry), leaving behind a concentrated cake of chocolate solids that’s ground into powder. It’s been used in baking since the 19th century, and it’s still the easiest way to infuse recipes with serious chocolate flavor.

natural vs. dutch-processed: what’s the difference

• Natural cocoa powder is more acidic and reacts with baking soda (which is what we’re using here). It gives a slightly tangier, fruiter flavor.
• Dutch-processed cocoa has been alkalized to reduce acidity. It’s darker in color, mellower in taste, and doesn’t react with baking soda unless an acid is added.

In this recipe, we’ll stick with natural cocoa — it plays nice with the baking soda and gives that classic brownie bite.