Thibault Liger-Belair Corton Grand Cru Renardes 2005

89-91 David Schildknecht - Wine Advocate
Their owner was ready to grub-up the vines until Liger-Belair offered to turn their fruit into his 2005 Corton Renardes. Ripe black cherry wreathed in wood smoke in the nose leads to a particularly clear, pure, intensely-fruited palate with hints of smoke, red meat, and wet stone. This lacks the polish and dark depth exhibited by the Corton Rognets, but makes up for it in clarity and vivacity, finishing with chalk and salt accents as well as persistently bright, ripe black cherry fruit.
In this his fourth vintage, and (like his cousin at Comte Liger-Belair in Vosne-Romanee) young, ambitious in the pursuit of quality, well-traveled, and in the process of taking back family property from rental and negociant contracts, Thibault Liger-Belair is ensconced in deep, ancient, and bitterly-cold cellars in the center of Nuits-St.-Georges. He has begun pursuing a biodynamic regimen in his vineyards and has inaugurated a rigorously-controlled negociant arm (its wines labeled “Thibault Liger-Belair Successeurs” and designated “S” in my listings). He says he approached 2005 with great caution lest the wines lose polish and finesse to over-extraction of tannins. Certainly the results have included some very powerful and formidably structured wines. Low sulfur and a significant inclusion of whole clusters (“depending on the circumstances and site,” he says, “- I have no system”) are among other prominent features of Liger-Belair’s approach in 2005.