1990s Special Order Red Mark

2026-02-20

What comes across strongest with this tea is a deeply layered dried fruit and medicinal herb flavor, present upfront and lingering quite a bit on the palate after swallowing - that's the most dominant impression.

There's also good complexity, with sweetness woven in, and a slight fruity-zesty note along the side of the tongue. A tea whose edges aren't fully polished yet. What balances that is the aftertaste: it stays mouthwatering and sweet, and over time the session slowly resolves into more sweetness.

A lot of what this tea offers is hard to fully articulate - more like a sense of woody boxiness in the mouth, as though the tea is somewhat closed in.

I feel this tea somewhat unsettling to my stomach, can not pinpoint what it is about but I can tell the body feels that somethings not quite right, hence the lower rating.

Energy-wise it's quite interesting - a strong centering quality with the feeling that the energy goes quite deep, more vertical than horizontal, nicely aged depth.

Tastewise it’s nicely rich, nicely aged and complex.

That slight stomach unsettledness, and scratchyness in the throat is the reason it ranks lower for me.