It pains me to have to write this but – if I had just ordered the bottle of Crown Ambassador 2010 which is sitting in front of me at a certain landmark Melbourne restaurant, I’d be sending it straight back.

As my host is the man responsible for it – Carlton & United Breweries head brewer John Cozens – I let good manners prevail. Besides, we’ve just enjoyed a leisurely bottle of ’09 Crown Ambassador over several courses of tasty tucker. This brew has mellowed nicely over the past 12 months and developed some pleasant new flavour nuances, particularly as it warmed up.

But the current vintage is something else, I’m afraid. The first whiff is rank and confronting, while a quick swallow confirms a certain unwanted presence. I wait for my host’s reaction.

“It does have a hint of sulphur,” says Cozens, “which I think is due to this year’s hops. It’s a bit pongy at first, but it does flash off quickly. It does have the potential to be a better beer in a year’s time.”

Beer tasting is highly subjective. Where Cozens detected a whiff of sulphur, I reckon it’s chockful with feral yeast flavours and the telltale presence of wet horse blanket. Brettanomyces to be precise, a wild yeast character known as “brett” around the traps; which is favoured by Belgian lambic beer producers and some English farmhouse cidermakers, but feared by most winemakers and brewers alike.

How on earth did it find its way into this third vintage of Crown Ambassador?

Cozens puts the flavour variation down to the Galaxy hops and the different conditions they experienced while harvesting them fresh at the Myrtleford hop garden in mid-March.

“Last year it was sunny, I was wearing a hat and there wasn’t much water in the river,” he said. “This year we picked in the rain, we got rather damp and the hops were noticeably greener and bigger.”

While Crown Ambassador is bittered with regular Pride of Ringwood hops, the fresh, unkilned Galaxy hops are added later in the brewing process for flavour and aroma.

“I think we’ll get more of a vintage variation this year,” he said.

“We used pretty much the same formula as last year but added a small amount of ’09 Ambassador which had been in French oak for 12 months.” The wood-aged beer accounted for around seven per cent of the total volume of the 2010 vintage, comprising some 7,000 numbered long-neck bottles. The wood-aged portion was added to the current batch immediately prior to bottling.

Could it be that one of those wooden barrels which previously held Penfolds white wine, was infected with “brett”? I asked. “We had them all thoroughly tested and they were fine,” he said.

“There may be a slight bottle-to-bottle variation, particularly with the resinous hop character.”

Cozens says he wants Crown Ambassador to be taken seriously and treated like a fine wine but my tasting of the 2010 vintage suggests they will have a lot of ground to make up on that score.

Crown Ambassador Reserve 2010 is available at $90 per 750ml bottle, along with specially selected and etched Riedel glasses at $110 a pair.

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The Local Taphouse, Darlinghurst is staging a Canadian-themed Moose & Mountie SpecTAPular on Saturday 14 August, 12noon-1am, gold coin entry, featuring several Canadian craft beers on tap for the first time in Australia.

TASTING NOTES

CROWN AMBASSADOR 2009 (10.2%)

Murky copper-amber. Aroma: toffee, faint spice and winey notes. Palate: sweetish toffee/caramel notes upfront; some ripe tropical fruit mid-palate; caramel-laden finish with hints of dried peaches and cream, and some hot alcohol notes as the beer warms up. Overall: mellower in character with some appealing dried fruit notes.

CROWN AMBASSADOR 2010 (10.2%)

Hazy copper-amber. Aroma: twang of wet horse blanket mixed with strong barnyard characters. Palate: harsh horsey flavour notes give way to sweet caramel, ripe fruit and a substantial, resionous bitterness, with a jangling, unbalanced finish. Overall: keep your money in your pocket.