WHAT IS BUBBLE TEA?
photo credit: Andy Woodall
Bubble tea is a cool, refreshing, sweet drink with boba, aka tapioca pearls (or flavored jellies, or popping boba) sitting on the bottom of a clear cup. It is a specialty dessert drink that comes with a fruit or milk tea base, a variety of flavors, and a uniquely fat straw to suck up the boba.
Tapioca pearls are usually black but can be white or transparent in color. It varies depending on the ingredients of the pearl. White and translucent pearls are made of tapioca starch, while black pearls includes tapioca starch, sometimes cassava root, brown sugar and caramel to add the black color.
The consistency of tapioca pearls are somewhere between jell-o and chewing gum. Many people think it's similar to the texture of a gummy bear. The tapioca texture is completely unique! The pearls are approximately the size of a marble.
BUBBLE TEA ORIGINATED IN TAIWAN IN THE EARLY 1980S AT A SMALL TEA STAND.
After a long day of school, elementary school children would purchase a cup of tea at nearby tea stands. One concession stand became particularly popular when she added different fruit flavorings to her tea. Soon everyone else started adding flavorings to theirs. In order to fully enjoy the flavor the tea needed to be shaken. This shaking formed bubbles in the tea alas bubble tea was born.
Then in 1983 Liu Han-Chieh introduced Taiwan to tapioca pearls. The new fad became adding tapioca pearls into your favorite drink. Because the pearls were served in cold infused tea and were sitting on the bottom, they also looked like bubbles. Bubbles floated on top and bottom of the drinks.
Bubble tea is also known as Boba drink, Pearl tea drink, Boba ice tea, Boba, Boba Nai Cha, Zhen Zhou Nai Cha, Pearl milk tea, Pearl ice tea, Black pearl tea, Tapioca ball drink, BBT, PT, Pearl shake, QQ (which means chewy in taiwanese) and possibly many others.
