Austria · Leithaberg

Weingut Ceel

A Rust, Burgenland project pairing Blaufränkisch with clay, Syrah with weathered slate and Chardonnay with limestone.

The producer

Weingut Ceel brings together Markus Fischl, Martin Kern and Franz Raith, who have made wine in Rust since 2010; Fischl is the winemaker. The core grapes are hand-harvested and vinified in a purist manner, with each variety tied to a stated ground: Blaufränkisch to clay, Syrah to weathered slate and Chardonnay to limestone.

The range runs from Weissburgunder to Blaufränkisch Reserve, Blaufränkisch Alte Reben and Syrah Reserve. Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023 is the clearest starting point: a dry red matured in a 500-litre wooden cask, with sour cherry, blackberry, thyme and bitter chocolate around acidity, tannin and a close-knit texture.

Known for

Hand-harvested Burgenland wines built around grape-and-soil pairings, especially clay-linked Blaufränkisch.

Notable facts

The story

A name from Rust’s record

When Markus Fischl, Martin Kern and Franz Raith began making wine together in Rust in 2010, they called the project CEEL. The name refers to the town’s first documented mention, dated 1317. The trio worked from a traditional building in central Rust, harvesting Blaufränkisch, Syrah and Chardonnay by hand for wines made under that name. Their bottles therefore carried a word connected to a medieval written record of Rust while the project itself was newly active. CEEL became the name used for the wines made by Fischl, Kern and Raith from their base at Hauptstraße 2, 7071 Rust.

From the atlas

Weingut Ceel

At A Glance

The Producer

Weingut Ceel is a three-person project based at Hauptstraße 2 in Rust, Burgenland. Markus Fischl, Martin Kern and Franz Raith have made wine together since 2010, with Fischl identified as winemaker. Their central idea is concrete: pair Blaufränkisch with clay, Syrah with weathered slate and Chardonnay with limestone, then harvest the core grapes by hand. That structure puts soil alongside grape variety before the wine reaches the cellar.

Place

Ceel works from Rust in Burgenland, where the winery occupies a traditional building in the town centre. Rust is not used here as a decorative address: it is the named home of a range that moves from Weissburgunder to Blaufränkisch and Syrah. The label therefore leads back to one place while the wines separate themselves through grape and ground.

Soil And Site

Clay is the stated home ground for Ceel’s Blaufränkisch, weathered slate for Syrah and limestone for Chardonnay. Those pairings matter most in the red range: Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023 is associated with clay and limestone, while Syrah Reserve comes from the slate-linked side of the estate. Rather than treating every red as one Burgenland style, Ceel gives each grape a different physical starting point.

Story

The project began in 2010 as a return to the roots for Fischl, Kern and Raith, working from a traditional central-Rust building. Its wines are built around a compact set of varieties instead of a long, diffuse catalogue: Blaufränkisch carries the clay connection, Syrah the weathered slate connection, and Chardonnay the limestone connection. That focus also reaches into the cellar, where the core grapes are hand-harvested and vinified in a purist manner.

Ceel has a documented marker in its red-wine history: Syrah Alte Reben 2015 won the Falstaff Red Wine Award. The award belongs to a specific mature-vine Syrah bottling, rather than making a claim for every wine under the name.

Vineyards And Cellar

Hand harvesting is part of the work on Ceel’s core grapes, followed by purist vinification. For Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023, the recorded maturation vessel is a 500-litre wooden cask. That scale of wood ageing sits beside a wine described through sour cherry, blackberry, herbs and dark chocolate, so the cask is part of the bottle’s shape without turning it into an overtly woody red.

Wines

The current range includes Weissburgunder 2024, Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023 and Syrah Reserve 2023, with Blaufränkisch also appearing as Alte Reben. Weissburgunder provides the white side of the range; the reds then divide between clay-linked Blaufränkisch and slate-linked Syrah. It is a short lineup with clear changes in grape, ground and expected structure rather than a stack of near-identical labels.

Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023 is the most fully documented bottle: it is made from Blaufränkisch and has been described with ripe black cherry, blackberry, thyme and bitter chocolate. Blaufränkisch Alte Reben moves toward dark sour cherry, clove and cinnamon, bringing darker fruit and warmer spice into view. Syrah Reserve occupies a separate track through the weathered-slate pairing, while the award-winning 2015 Syrah Alte Reben shows that the estate has also made a mature-vine Syrah under that name.

In The Glass

Ceel’s 2023 Blaufränkisch opens in dark and red fruit: sour cherry, black cherry, blackberry and red plum appear across the documented tasting notes. Herbal spice, thyme, bread, bouillon, dry wood and dark chocolate add savoury detail around the fruit. The palate has been described as dry and medium-bodied, with medium-high acidity in one assessment and a fruit-led, close-knit texture in another.

Tannin is not fixed in the published descriptions. One note finds gentle tannin; another finds powerful, very ripe tannin; a third finds balanced tannins. The finish is similarly variable, from long in one tasting to muted in another. What holds across those views is a dry Blaufränkisch with dark fruit, savoury seasoning and wood-aged shape, rather than a simple juicy red.

A Bottle To Understand It

Begin with Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023. It brings together the estate’s main red grape, its clay-and-limestone association and maturation in a 500-litre wooden cask. Expect sour cherry and black cherry alongside blackberry, thyme and bitter chocolate, with dry fruit, acidity and tannin carrying the wine through the finish. It is the most useful introduction because its grape, ground and cellar treatment are all documented in the same bottle.

Anecdote

When Markus Fischl, Martin Kern and Franz Raith began making wine together in Rust in 2010, they gave the project a name drawn from the town’s earlier record: CEEL. The name refers to Rust’s first documented mention in 1317. Their wines were being made from hand-harvested Blaufränkisch, Syrah and Chardonnay in a traditional building in central Rust, but the name on the bottles reached further back than the new project itself. CEEL became the form under which the trio’s Rust wines appeared, linking a modern winery name to a dated written trace of the town.

Final Word

Ceel is most clearly read through its grape-and-ground pairings: Blaufränkisch with clay, Syrah with weathered slate and Chardonnay with limestone. Blaufränkisch Reserve 2023 puts that approach into a dry, dark-fruited, wood-aged red with sour-cherry lift and savoury detail.

Sources

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