Gritty McDuff’s Brewing Co.
Portland, ME
Available: FL, MA, ME, NH, NJ, NY, PA, RI, VT
Maine’s original brewpub, Gritty McDuff’s, opened in Portland’s Old Port in 1988. It now also has branches in Freeport and Auburn.
ABV: 4.7
ABW: 3.8
Bitterness: 16
Original gravity: 1044
Black Fly Stout is a smooth operator, pouring dark-as-night in the glass with a skiff of a tan-colored head that fleetingly recedes. Rich aromas of roasted malt and nuts mingle with some smoke and chocolate, with similar flavors following suit. Black Fly fills your mouth with a richer array of flavors than you would expect from the body of this beer. While certainly not thin, it’s more nimble in the mouth, and certainly not as viscous as the flavors might indicate. This is one fly you won’t want to shoo away.
If you like your stouts tasty, but crisp, dry and slender, Black Fly’s the beer for you. In appearance it lives up to its name, leading you to anticipate bitter, dark flavors, and, while suggestions of orange and chocolate figure in the biscuity aroma, along with some sweet spices, the taste is certainly bitter right from the start, courtesy of well-roasted malts supported by tangy hops. Sweet spices and fruit feature again, but then in comes the very dry, but not too deep, finish, loaded with smoky, burnt grains. The modest strength and slight body add to the drinkability.
Lisa Morrison, aka The Beer Goddess, writes about beer whenever she can and also gets to talk about it on a weekly radio show in her hometown of Portland, OR.
Author of the Good Bottled Beer Guide and The Book of Beer Knowledge, Jeff Evans is an eight-time editor of the CAMRA Good Beer Guide and one of Britain's best-known beer writers.
