Non-tradition Rot

Christian Tschida farms ~14 ha around Illmitz on the eastern shore of Lake Neusiedl, with parcels in Leithaberg on the lake's western shore. Fourth-generation grower; Christian took over from his father Fritz in 2003, extending Fritz's chemical-free viticulture into the cellar. Indigenous-yeast ferments in large neutral Stockinger barrels, no racking, gravity-only handling, unfined and unfiltered, zero added sulphur since the 2015 vintage. Dense plantings and hand-harvest. In 2016 he became the first fully sulphur-free producer ever named Gault Millau Austrian Winemaker of the Year - a useful marker of how far his approach had moved from the country's mainstream by then.

Non-tradition Rot is 100% Cabernet Franc from a ~1 ha selection across three parcels (Eisner, Thenau, Bimusgrube on limestone with schist), ~40-year vines. Hand-harvested, fully destemmed (despite Tschida's reputation for whole-cluster elsewhere); spontaneous fermentation in large barrels with ~6 weeks of total skin contact. ~2 years in Stockinger oak. Bottled with no added SO2.

The Non-tradition line is deliberately stylistically and commercially outside the Austrian Wine Act - labelled simply Non-tradition rather than Burgenland DAC or Qualitätswein. First release: 2015. 2018 was hot and dry with the earliest harvest in living memory in Burgenland; that this comes in at 12.5% reflects early-picking discipline rather than vintage character.