Peter and Sandra Fischer at Château Revelette (photo: Greg Moore)
Although Peter Fischer was born in Germany, he dreamed of becoming a cowboy. So he went to California in the late 1970s where he worked on a ranch, before enrolling at UC Davis and becoming a winemaker. After a short stay at Buena Vista, and a year with the Provençal enologist Emmanuel Gaujal he set out on his own. With the help of his parents, he purchased Château Revelette (and just as his new father-in-law had done thirty years earlier, married the owner’s daughter).
The incredible, park-like estate is high on the northern flank of Cézanne’s Mont Sainte-Victoire, which rises above the town of Aix-en-Provence, and shelters the vineyards from the warming influence of the Mediterranean. Harvest is a full two weeks later than further south, so the grapes can achieve physiologic maturity before they become overripe, giving the wines a more “northern” aromatic and structural profile than any others in this part of Provence. All of the farming is organic, drawing from the discipline of biodynamics, and the wines are in high demand at restaurants like Troisgros in Roanne and Pic in Valence. Peter’s label sweetly acknowledges that he is a vigneron de gendre à gendre, a winegrower from “son-in-law to son-in-law.”
