Brick Oven

Here at Point Blank Brewing we use our own custom made brick oven to cook our food. It gives our pizza a non traditional taste compared to what you're used to with places like Papa Johns where all they use is a normal oven and the pizzas taste the same. The brick oven at Point Blank gives the pizza more of an outdoorsy taste (per say) because of the wood fire.

The brick oven at Point Blank Brewing can cook a pizza as quick as 90 seconds. Amazing, I know.

A brick oven is made out of clay adobe, refractory fire bricks, or refractory concrete - which is a heat resistance mix. They are usually inexpensive to make and materials can be found almost anywhere. The brick oven at Point Blank was custom built by the owner, Nathan Blank and his co-workers. They had a lot of their materials shipped to them. 

A fire is built inside the oven and the heat is absorbed into the walls making it stay hot. The oven door and chimney are left open and the fire can be maintained or slowly die down. In a restaurant they would keep the fire going all night in order to insure they can make food anytime someone comes in. A typical oven doesn't take very long to preheat, but a brick oven could take up to two or more hours to get hot depending on size. 

At Point Blank Brewing the brick oven produces delicious foods for their customers such as pizza, calzones, bread sticks, and much more! Come in and try out our brick oven pizza today! 

December Events in Corydon

Below is a list of events happening in Corydon from now until the end of December. Please try to attend any that interest you, as we love to support our local small businesses. If you know of any other events please feel free to list them in the comments section below and we will add them to this post. Thanks for reading!

The Artisan Center: John Walters’ Carvings for Christmas

November 24-December 22

Artisan Center

117 East Chestnut Street

Corydon, IN 47712

812-738-2123

https://harrison-county-arts-corydon.net

The Artisan Center will feature John Walters’ Carvings for Christmas. Walters is a retired cabinetmaker who enjoys working with hand tools in his shop.

Hayswood Theatre presents Papa’s Angels

November 30-December 16

(Friday and Saturday at 8pm, Sunday at 2pm)

Hayswood Theatre

115 S. Capitol Ave

Corydon, IN 47112

812-738-2138

http://www.hayswoodtheatre.com

Set in the Smokey Mountains during the mid 1930s, Papa’s Angels is about a poor family faced with tragedy during the holiday season. It is a magical tale of family love that is as heartwarming as it is funny.

Winter Wine Walk

December 15

Point Blank Brewing Company

103 E. Beaver St.

Corydon, IN 47112

812-968-5510

Shop at locally owned downtown businesses, sample wines from twelve local wineries and enjoy the sights and sounds of the season. Begin the walk at the Blaine H. Wiseman Visitors Center (310 N. Elm Street). Admission is $10 with proceeds benefiting The Harrison County Artisan Center. Advanced tickets are available at Cellar on the Square/Point Blank Brewing.

Live Nativity

December 22

(4:00pm to 8:00pm)

Historic Downtown Corydon

Corydon, IN 47112

812-738-1869

http://www.firstcapitalchristian.org

Live Nativity scene on the square in historic downtown Corydon and re-creation of Bethlehem on the night Christ was born.

History of Beer

The History of Beer

    It has been said to believe that prehistoric nomads may have made beer from grain and water before learning to make bread.

4300 BC, Babylonian clay tablets detail recipes for beer.

Beer was an important part of civilization in the Babylonian, Assyrian, Egyptian, Hebrew, Chinese, and Inca cultures. 

Babylonians produced a variety of flavors of beer and generally in large quantities. 

Different grains were used in different cultures:

a) Africa used millet, maize and cassava.

b) North America used persimmon although agave was used in Mexico.

c) South America used corn although sweet potatoes were used in Brazil.

d) Japan used rice to make sake.

e) China used wheat to make samshu.

f) Other Asian cultures used sorghum.

g) Russians used rye to make quass or kvass.

h) Egyptians used barley and may have cultivated it strictly for brewing as it made poor bread

55 BC Roman Legions introduce beer to Northern Europe

49 BC Caesar toasted his troops after crossing the Rubicon

23 BC Chinese brewed beer called "kiu"

1000 AD hops begins to be used in the brewing process

1200 AD beer making is established and commercialized in Germany, Austria, and England

1420 German brewers develop large method for brewing

1553 Beck's Brewery was founded (still running today)

1612 first commercial brewery opens in New Amsterdam

1620 Pilgrims land at Plymouth Rock for beer supplies

1674 Harvard College has its own brewhouse

Before the 1800's beer was really "Ale"

1810 Munich declares Oktoberfest as an official celebration

Modern era of brewing in the US began in late 1800's with commercial refrigeration, automatic bottling, pasteurization, and railroad distributions. 

1890 Pabst is the first US brew to sell over 1 million barrels

1933 Prohibition ends for beer

1935 the beer can was introduced

1966 Budweiser is the first brand to sell 10 million barrels in a year

1991 the US produces 20% of the world beer volume

1993 US retail beer sales exceed $45 billion

Five brewers produced 89.4% of domestic product:

a) Anheuser-Busch (A-B), 44.5%

b) Miller Brewing, 21.8%

c) Coors, 10.4%

d) Stroh, 7.4%

                          e) G. Heileman, 5.3%

How to Brew Beer

Point Blank Brewing Company will be brewing their own beer in phase two of their plans. The brewing area will be approximately 1000 square feet and will be the most visible viewing area to the customers. It will consist of the brewing vessels including mash / lauter tun, brew kettle, whirlpool, hot liquor tank, and cold liquor tank. An average brew will take six hours to complete.

To brew your own beer at home you need a few basic things:

- Malt extract (liquid or dried)
- Hops
- Specialty grains
- Yeast

Keys to success: keep your area clean and rinse everything well.

Step 1: Make the Starter Wort

Ingredients:
- 2 quarts water
- 6 ounces
- 1 package instant starter wort

First, heat the water and malt to a boil for 10 minutes and then cool to 60 degrees F.

Sanitize the gallon container with a no-rinse sterilizer or by following the manufacturer's instructions. Then, pitch the yeast by tossing in around 33 billion yeast cells (numbers depend on your starter kit) into the 60-degree wort. Cover the starter wort and put aside. Make sure the container is not airtight (aluminum foil will do the job).

Bottle the Wort then add yeast to the Wort. 

Step 2: Make the Mash

Ingredients:
- 11 pounds of grain
- 11 quarts of water

Take the mash and bring it up to 150 degrees F, keeping that temperature for one hour

* Test the mash: The point of mashing is to turn starches in the grain into sugars and extract them into a sweet liquor. 


Add 11 pounds of grain for the mash. Stir the mash. 

Step 3: Straining and sparging

Pour the mash into a lauter tun to drain the sweet liquor from the grain. 

Capture the runoff liquor into a brew pot.

Heat the rest of the water about 1/2 gallon per pound of grain at 180 degrees F over the grain in the lauter tun. 

Capture the runoff again in the brew pot.

The sweet liquor in the brew pot is the wort. 

Step 4: The boil

Ingredients: 
- 1 ounce hops
- 1/2 teaspoons of ginger
- 1 cinnamon stick 

Once reached a boil add the hops to the wort and continue to boil for one hour. 

Add cinnamon stick in the last 5 minutes of the boil.

Step 5: Cool the beer and pitch the yeast

*Cooling can be achieved with a wort chiller

The beer should be cooled to 68 degrees F, strained and transferred to a sanitized carboy, where the beer will stay for the first few days of fermentation. 

After one week, visible fermentation will have subsided and the wort should be transferred to another sanitized container.

Two weeks after the beer should be bottled. 

Step 6: Bottling 

Take 3/4 cup of corn sugar and boil for 15 minutes in a pint of water. 

Cool the sugar water and add it to the bottom of a bottling bucket, transfer the beer to the bucket. 

*The sugar water gives the yeast something to eat while inside the sealed bottle for a final stage of fermentation. 

After two weeks at room temperature, the beer should be fully carbonated and ready to drink. 

At Point Blank Brewing they will produce continuously throughout the year, with a target goal of 240 barrels a month. Anticipated beer styles that will be brewed include pale ales, stouts, porters, ambers, light lagers, as well as seasonal beers - bocks, marzens, wheat, etc.

Opening Night

We fired up the brick oven pizza Thursday night for the Grand Opening of Point Blank Brewing Company, if you weren't there you missed out on a great night of food, friends, and fun! But don't fret, now that we're open you can come in and get your own brick oven pizza anytime you want. Incase you don't know we offer appetizers from hummus, breadsticks, wings, to fried pickles, and fried mac and cheese balls. We can make sandwiches like the Reuben, 1/2 pound burger, and bratwursts. Pasta dishes, any kind of pizza toppings you can imagine for your 6 or 12 inch pizza, and entrees such as steak, pork chops, and many more!

Our yummy baked spaghetti

Fried pickles and fried mushrooms

12" cheese pizza

Calzone

Meet the Owner: Nathan Blank

With Point Blank Brewing's grand opening tomorrow we thought it would be a great idea to let our readers know a little bit about the man behind the plan. Nathan Blank, owner of Cellar on the Square, has been working hard for over a year to open Point Blank Brewing Company and will act as General Manager. Located in historic downtown Corydon, we will serve brick oven pizza, pasta dishes, burgers, and other sandwiches.

Nathan is a 2001 graduate of Corydon Central High School. He received his Bachelor's degree in Business Management and Entrepreneurship from Ball State University in 2005 and his MBA in Finance in 2007. After spending a semester in Italy during his undergraduate program, he discovered his passion for grapes and wine and started his own small vineyard when he returned home. He decided he needed a location to sell his grapes and wanted a place where others could come and learn the art of brewing, which is why he opened Cellar on the Square in 2007. Opening a brewpub has been a dream of his for quite some time and has been in the planning stages for over a year. 

Nathan's vision for Point Blank Brewing is to maximize shareholder wealth, create 40-50 new jobs in the county, use locally produced raw materials when available, and promote the "green" movement. Nathan also hopes to improve the local dining and entertainment scene. 

Starting tomorrow Point Blank Brewing will be open for business, showcasing our full menu. Please stop by, give us a try and let us know about your experience.  

We are open from 11:00 am-11:00 pm and located at 103 E. Beaver Street Corydon, IN. For questions or carryout please call (812)-225-5141.  We look forward to serving you. 

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