Summary
Moric is the project of Roland Velich and is today regarded as the single most important address for Blaufränkisch. Since 2001, Velich has worked to lift Burgenland's leading red variety out of the shadow of jammy fruit and new oak – with old vines, low yields and a cellar in which as little as possible happens. Around 22.5 hectares in Mittelburgenland and on the Leithagebirge supply the grapes, many of them from parcels between 40 and well over 100 years old. The wines are cool, savoury, taut and age-worthy – and they have given Austrian red wine a new international stage.
History
Roland Velich came to wine by a detour: he first worked outside the trade and then joined the family estate Velich in Apetlon by Lake Neusiedl, which is known above all for white wine. His own subject, though, turned out to be red – more precisely Blaufränkisch, which he found in Mittelburgenland in a state that did not convince him: plenty of extract, plenty of new barrique, little sense of origin.
In 2001 he started his own project from this, which from 2002 continued independently as Moric. The decisive work lay at first not in the cellar but in the vineyard: Velich deliberately sought out old, often forgotten Blaufränkisch parcels in Neckenmarkt and Lutzmannsburg and secured them piece by piece, largely through long-term leases and agreements with local grower families. Sites on the Leithagebirge were added later.
International recognition came quickly: by the late 2000s Moric wines were among the first Austrian reds to be listed at the top by influential critics. From the 2019 vintage Velich went a step further and now bottles individual sites in Lutzmannsburg separately, in order to make the differences within the village audible.
Location & Terroir
Moric works in two very different landscapes. Mittelburgenland – often called Blaufränkischland – sits between the foothills of the Ödenburg mountains and the Pannonian plain. Neckenmarkt is the cooler, steeper part: slopes that catch the wind coming off the hills, with lean, weathered soils. The vines have to work here, which leads to taut, mineral-seeming wines with pronounced acidity.
Lutzmannsburg lies around ten kilometres away, flatter and warmer, with deep loam and clay soils over an old, iron-rich subsoil. The estate's oldest vines stand here, some more than 100 years old, with correspondingly deep root systems. The wines feel denser, darker and rounder than those from Neckenmarkt.
On the Leithagebirge, finally, limestone and schist shape the character: the wines from there are brighter, finer and more acid-driven. These three signatures side by side make clear how strongly Blaufränkisch reacts to origin – which is precisely the estate's founding thesis.
Style & Philosophy
Velich's guiding idea is to vinify Blaufränkisch as if it were a Grand Cru from Burgundy. Above all that means leaving things out. Harvesting is done by hand in several passes with strict selection. Fermentation runs spontaneously with the vineyard's own yeasts in open wooden vats, with roughly three weeks of maceration. The wines then age for many months – up to two years for the top bottlings – on the fine lees in large, used wooden casks. New barrique plays no leading role. As a rule the wines are neither fined nor filtered.
In the vineyard the work is largely manual, with low yields and a close-to-nature approach. The goal is not maximum ripeness but phenolic ripeness at moderate alcohol – which is why the wines feel cooler and slimmer than Burgenland might suggest, and gain considerably with bottle age.
Notable Sites & Wines
The range is consistently tiered:
- Blaufränkisch Burgenland – the entry point, already with the typical cool spice
- Blaufränkisch Reserve – fruit from old vines in Neckenmarkt and Lutzmannsburg
- Blaufränkisch Alte Reben Neckenmarkt – taut, mineral in character, with a clear acid structure
- Blaufränkisch Alte Reben Lutzmannsburg – the flagship wine from the oldest parcels
- Single-vineyard wines from Lutzmannsburg (bottled separately since the 2019 vintage), among them Kirchberg, Schwemmer and Maissner
- Plus small quantities of Grüner Veltliner
Awards
Moric is among the highest-rated estates in Austria. As early as 2009 a Moric red was one of the first Austrian reds to reach the 95-point range in international criticism. In 2023 Roland Velich was named Falstaff Winemaker of the Year; the estate has been listed there with top ratings for years. Particular attention went to the Blaufränkisch Lutzmannsburg Alte Reben 2023, to which JamesSuckling.com awarded 100 points – the first Austrian red wine on that platform to achieve this – with the Maissner and Schwemmer bottlings following just behind. Jancis Robinson has simply called Velich the world's best Blaufränkisch producer.