Meet the new kid on the menu (with three names): pearl milk, boba, and bubble tea.
Bubble tea is a global phenomenon – you can find it everywhere from Taiwan and Australia to U.S., Europe, and the Middle East. It’s delicious, fun, and refreshing.
The basic recipe is simple: black tea, milk, ice, and chewy tapioca balls. Leslie Nguyen-Okwu described it in Eater as “all shaken together like a martini and served with that famously fat straw to accommodate the marbles of tapioca that cluster at the bottom of the cup.”
Yum.
The new kid comes from Taiwan (see Taipei City, Taiwan below) – the island that dates back thousands of years. Today it’s an independent U.S. ally with China hovering, claiming the island belongs to them. There is no war yet but the threat is always there.
The battle over who invented bubble tea is almost as fierce as the fight over who owns Taiwan.
It took over ten years to decide, finally ending up in court.
Tu Tsung-ho was the founder of Hanlin Tea Room – today an international tea house based in Taichung, Taiwan. One day in 1986, he was at the market and saw white-colored tapioca balls. He had a great idea. Why not add them to tea? The tiny balls would provide color and texture.
He brought them home, cooked the tapioca balls into pearly, semi-translucent pieces, and added them to sweet cold milk tea. He called it “pearl milk tea.” According to Chun Shui Tang in The Kopi, he decided to sell the drink at his tea house. It’s still sold today with “white and black tapioca balls as options.”
Chun Shui Tang, owner of another Taiwan teahouse, maintained that the true inventor was a 20-year old employee, Lin-Hsiu-Hui, in 1987. She took her favorite childhood snack – tapioca balls (see below) – and added it to sweet iced milk tea – calling it bubble tea.
The drink was wildly popular. Hanlin and Chun Shui Tang went to battle over licensing and patents. The problem was that no one could provide proof of their stories. There was no solution as the demand grew.
No one won the case.
Edward Jones in the Taipei Times added to the mystery. “There is an intriguing alternative explanation,” he wrote, “bubble tea goes back to the days of the British Empire.” They had an “iced drink/dessert called cendol or chendol . . . drank to provide respite from the tropical heat. The Brits always added milk to their tea.”
Who knows?
While the origin remains a mystery, the evolution of bubble tea has been fostered around the world. Today the flavors, colors, and toppings reflect where it’s served.
Depending on the culture, region, and available local ingredients, bubble tea is part of the landscape. Head to Singapore and you might find it served in a bowl. Check out Australia where it’s part of social gatherings with environmentally-conscious fresh ingredients. In Las Vegas, U.S. it’s sold at “No. 1 Boba Tea” with flavors ranging from mango, strawberry & banana, to vanilla chai. Tasty combinations are offered in Israel like brown sugar brulee and magic matcha.
Bubble tea is amazingly adaptable. For example, the traditional black tea can be replaced by green, white, or oolong. The milk can be whole, skim, creamer, or non-dairy, and the tapioca balls can be black, white, colored, or translucent. The result can be sweeter, sugar-free, or flavored with fruit juice. A creative mixologist can top it with anything from local fruits, whipped cream, and crushed cookies. There is also boba tea pizza, ice cream, cookies, and cocktails.
You can make it at home with a mix.
With a $3.1 billion global market and growing, bubble tea is an international delight. Look around the corner – there’s probably a vendor or café serving it right now.
Got bubbles. Enjoy!
Fun! Great article. I’ve actually been curious about Boba tea and how it developed since recently discovering how tasty and refreshing it is. Almost feels like a liquid meal thanks to the tapioca. I had not even heard of it until a few years ago but apparently I’m a bit behind the times, considering its illustrious-and hotly contested-history!