Red, White, and Brew: New Beer from George Washington’s Recipe
To celebrate America’s 250th, the New York Public Library teamed up with a local brewery to re-create a historic recipe.
This summer, New York is celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence like George Washington would have: with beer. The library brought out a handwritten recipe from a 1757 notebook written by Washington, which is currently in its Manuscripts and Archives Division. TALEA Beer Co., based in New York City, is re-creating the recipe as Liberty Lager, which will be available for a limited time in TALEA taprooms and New York City locations.
In 1757, Washington was a colonel in the Virginia militia during the French and Indian War (1754-1763). The notebook in the library’s collection, which has been digitized and is available for online viewing, includes memoranda, outlines for letters to figures like the Governor of Virginia, and lists of important information like officers’ commissions in Washington’s handwriting. The recipe “To Make Small Beer” is on the last page.
Small beer, which was quick to make and had a low alcohol content, was an everyday drink in colonial America. Historically, sources of clear water were not always reliable, and, even if germ theory had yet to be developed, people understood that boiling water, a key step in beer brewing, made it safe to drink. Beer was usually brewed at home, and many early American cookbooks included multiple varieties, with various types of wild plants or cultivated fruits used as sources of sugar, flavorings, or preservatives. Washington’s recipe for small beer was apparently heavy on molasses, which appears to be common in early American brewing.
TALEA’s Liberty Lager adapts Washington’s recipe to modern tastes and production techniques. A blog post from the New York Public Library, published June 1, calls it “a ‘classic amber lager with subtle, malty sweetness and a hint of hops.’” At 6.5% alcohol, it is not a small beer. According to New York news outlet WABC, the brewery will also make “Washington’s Beer,” which follows the recipe as it was written.
In a press release on June 1, Brent Reidy, The New York Public Library’s Andrew W. Mellon Director of the Research Libraries, said, “By bringing George Washington’s beer recipe out of our archives and into the pint glasses of New Yorkers, we can connect our collection to the public we serve.” Tara Hankinson, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of TALEA Beer Co., agrees: “We’re proud to bring this lager to life together with The New York Public Library.”
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