Bubble Milk Tea (珍珠奶茶)
Strong black tea shaken ice-cold with milk and poured over chewy, brown-sugar-glazed tapioca pearls. Made from scratch, the pearls stay soft and springy for hours, not the hard little bullets you get from a bad batch.
Servings
Ingredients
Nutrition
Per serving
Steps
Make the dough
Stir the brown sugar into the boiling water until fully dissolved and dark. Pour it over the tapioca starch in a heatproof bowl and mix with a spoon or chopsticks until too hot to touch, then knead with your hands into a smooth, dark, slightly sticky dough. If it feels dry and won't come together, work in a teaspoon more boiling water.
- 100 g tapioca starch
- 30 g dark brown sugar
- 90 ml boiling water
✅ Done when: the dough is smooth, pliable and holds together without cracking at the edges
Roll the pearls
Pinch off pea-sized pieces of dough and roll each one between your palms into a tiny ball, about 1 cm. Dust them lightly with the reserved tapioca starch so they don't stick to each other. Work quickly, since the dough stiffens and gets harder to roll as it cools.
- 20 g tapioca starch, for dusting
✅ Done when: you have a tray of round, smooth, lightly dusted pearls that aren't sticking together
Cook the pearls
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Make the syrup
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Brew the tea
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Shake with milk
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Assemble and serve
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Make the dough
Stir the brown sugar into the boiling water until fully dissolved and dark. Pour it over the tapioca starch in a heatproof bowl and mix with a spoon or chopsticks until too hot to touch, then knead with your hands into a smooth, dark, slightly sticky dough. If it feels dry and won't come together, work in a teaspoon more boiling water.
- 100 g tapioca starch
- 30 g dark brown sugar
- 90 ml boiling water
✅ Done when: the dough is smooth, pliable and holds together without cracking at the edges
Roll the pearls
Pinch off pea-sized pieces of dough and roll each one between your palms into a tiny ball, about 1 cm. Dust them lightly with the reserved tapioca starch so they don't stick to each other. Work quickly, since the dough stiffens and gets harder to roll as it cools.
- 20 g tapioca starch, for dusting
✅ Done when: you have a tray of round, smooth, lightly dusted pearls that aren't sticking together
Cook the pearls
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Make the syrup
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Brew the tea
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Shake with milk
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Assemble and serve
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The Story Behind the Dish
Bubble milk tea was born in Taiwan in the 1980s, when tea shop cooks started tossing cooked tapioca balls — already a popular dessert topping — into cold, shaken milk tea. The combination of chewy pearls, strong tea and milk took off fast and spread across Taiwan's tea shops before travelling with Taiwanese and Chinese communities around the world.
Today it's one of the most recognisable drinks to come out of Chinese-speaking Asia, sold everywhere from street carts to specialist tea chains, with the wide straw as its signature detail.
⭐ Why It's Famous
It turned a simple cup of milk tea into something playful and textural, with every sip ending in a mouthful of chewy, sweet pearls.
💡 Fun Fact
The drink is sometimes called "boba" in English, a nickname that may come from a slang term in Cantonese and Taiwanese for a well-rounded figure, poking fun at the shape of the pearls.
Taichung, Taiwan
24.15°N, 120.67°E
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