Liberty Ale Success

Classification: pale ale, India pale ale, Liberty ale, extract

Source: Stephen Tinsley (a207613@sun278.dseg.ti.com), HBD Issue #1570, 11/4/94

Good news from the home front, my Liberty Ale came out great! Three weeks ago I began an attempt at Anchor Liberty Ale (one of my all-time faves), which was also my first foray into the partial-mash world. It was extremely hard work, having never mashed before, and I was getting a little worried (apologies to Charlie) that it wouldn't come out. I got the base recipe off of the Cat's Meow, then consulted with some local homebrew club regulars to come up with some grain additions.

Medium color, about like Anchor Liberty, but not as "orange". More of a light red color, reminiscent of Bass Ale. Serious hop nose! The cascade smell jumps right out of the glass. Good initial bitterness, Cascade is very assertive on the pallate, and finishes with light orange notes and a hint of spice. Pleasant aftertaste, and no off flavors. Excellent mouth-feel, plenty of body. No alcohol hotness at all, though the feeling in my head tells me it's all there! If I make this one again, and I think I probably will, I might use less Cascades for dry hopping. I used nothing but hop pellets, but I think next time I'll try using plugs, at least in the secondary. I thought I was going to have a problem with particles in the beer from the hop pellets in the secondary, but they eventually sank to the bottom, and I just siphoned above them. The beer is perfectly clear. I would suggest this recipe for anyone trying to emulate Anchor Liberty Ale.

Ingredients:

8 lbs Munton and Fisons light malt extract
1/2 lb 40L Crystal Malt
1/2 lb Munich Malt
1/2 lb Cara Pils Malt
1.5 oz Fuggles Hops (bittering)
3.5 oz Cascade Hops (flavor, aroma, dry-hop etc)
Wyeast 1056 American Ale yeast culture

Procedure:

Mash the Crystal, Munich and Cara Pils malts in a couple of quarts of 150 degree (all degrees in Farenheit, sorry non-US) water for about 30 minutes. Raise the temperature to 158 degrees, and hold it for 15 minutes. Raise the temperature to 168 degrees briefly, then sparge with another quart or two of 170 degree water. Add a gallon of water to mash, then boil it with the malt extract for 60 minutes. At the beginning of the boil add 1.5 oz Fuggles Hops. At 30 minutes add 1 oz Cascades. At 10 minutes add 1/2 oz Cascades. At the end of the boil, turn off the burner and add 1/2 oz of Cascades. Let this steep for 5-10 minutes. Cool and strain (if you aren't using hop bags) into fermenter. Pitch yeast and top off with cold water. Rack it in 1 week, and add 1.5 oz Cascades to the secondary fermenter. Wait one more week and bottle with 3/4 cups corn sugar. Wait one more week and serve very cold.