Since coming to Maine, I find I don't get to drink bubble tea as often as I would like to, but when I do I always remember how much I enjoy the contrast between the chewy tapioca balls and the smooth, sweet tea.
I ordered one while out to lunch with friends. You could see the silky black tapioca pearls lining the bottom of the cup, piled perhaps six or seven rows high. The tea itself was delicious, a long-steeped chai sweetened with condensed milk.
I resolved to make it again at home, and set about procuring the ingredients—a process that consisted of asking my mom to pick them up on her way home from work.
But, as so often happens with these sorts of projects when I'm at home on break, I never got around to it, and decided to make it when I got back to school instead.
Monday night, I finally did. And while it came out okay, I messed up in two major ways that I can think of.
First off, my timing was terrible—I forgot that I would need time to let the tea cool, and so I boiled the water while I was boiling the tapioca pearls.
My other mistake was slightly undercooking the tapioca. I boiled the balls for five minutes, like it said on the package, but they tasted a little bit soft.
It seems, however, that the pearls get slightly chewier when they cool down, and I rinsed them several times in cold water instead of letting them sit in the once-boiling water.
When I had done that, and the pearls had cooled down, they were definitely tougher than I'd have liked them to be.
The finished product still tasted very good, and I think it would go much smoother with more practice, but those are just two things to look out for.
You can find the pearls in a lot of Asian grocery stores, where you can also find the condensed milk and probably, the thick straws, though I used the ones from our very own Smith Union Café.
Ingredients:
Tapioca pearls
One chai tea bag per person
Sweetened condensed milk
Step one: Make your tea and put it in the refrigerator to chill a few hours. Do this before you start making the pearls.
Step two: Bring some water to a boil. Use about a cup for every half cup of tapioca pearls.
Step three: Pour your tapioca pearls into the water. I used about one sixth of a cup for one person, but the glasses I was using were pretty small, and perhaps up to a quarter cup per person would work.
When the pearls go in, they should be completely covered by the boiling water, and after a few minutes they will rise to the top of the pot.
Step four: Boil the pearls for five minutes, or maybe a little bit longer. Then, take the pot off the heat, and leave the pearls to sit, covered, for another five minutes. Drain them, and rinse them in cold water to stop them cooking.
Step five: While the pearls are cooking, sweeten the tea with the condensed milk to taste.
It's a little bit hard to get blended, so I poured the tea and milk into a washed-out coke bottle and shook it up.
When the pearls are done and cooled, drop them into the glasses of the tea, place a bubble tea straw in the glass, and enjoy!