By Aldona Bird
Newsroom@DominionPost.com
I discovered love of bubble tea and traveling at the same time. Late in my teens I visited my older sister in Boston.
We spent evenings together, but during the days when she worked I was on my own — which I really enjoyed. I’d look at the bus and train maps, pick a neighborhood and go explore.
I took the train to the Isabella Gardner Museum, browsed hole in the wall thrift shops, and then followed my sister’s recommendation to stop by the Boston Tea Shop in Cambridge.
At the lovely cafe, I ordered a matcha tea smoothie with boba. I immediately loved the chewy balls of tapioca (and frozen matcha tea), and sipped and chewed wandering around Cambridge.
I visited that shop several more times that trip. A few years went by before I had boba again, but my enjoyment of the chewable drink did not dwindle.
Bubble tea was invented in Taiwan in the 1980s, and took off in the US in the 1990s.
Pre-pandemic I stopped at TK’s Fruit Produce and Bubble Tea downtown often for a milk tea with bubbles.
Not having had boba in over a year, I was excited when Cindy Reeves Gay (check out her food blog!) sent me a copy of a boba cookbook — Boba by Kwong + Del Mundo, founders of MILK+T shop in Los Angeles.
While thumbing through the book I noticed their recipe for fresh boba. It called for water, brown sugar and tapioca flour. The process seemed fairly simple.
Not quite believing I could have bubble tea so easily any time I wanted, I watched videos online about how to make the chewy and addictive tapioca balls. It really did seem possible.
So I ordered tapioca flour from Mountain People’s Co Op, but they were out and substituted tapioca starch.
I noticed in the recipe book that the authors seemed to use the terms tapioca flour and starch interchangeably. An online search taught me that some think tapioca flour is made from the whole cassava root while starch is made from only the starchy pulp.
Others say both are the same, and the difference is only marketing. the recipe I used initially called for flour (then referred to it as starch later in the instructions). I used the starch I got in my order.
First I warmed the quarter cups each of water and brown sugar, then added a tablespoon of the three quarter cup of tapioca starch and stirred until it dissolved. Adding the rest of the starch seemed like too much, but with some kneading by hand the dough absorbed most of the soft white powder.
I am interested to try using tapioca flour next time, to see if the dough feels different — it felt as you’d expect a dough made of starch to feel. I rolled it into a noodle, cut it into small pieces and rolled into balls.
The fresh balls cooked in boiling water for 20 minutes, sat for another 20 minutes in the same water, and then for 15 in water with a bit of honey.
Although the amount of sugar wasn’t huge (I made about five drinks with this recipe), still I was surprised the bubbles didn’t taste sweet.
I served them to my family with tea I had on hand, iced with milk and partially whipped cream. It was tasty.
My next boba goal is to make a matcha tea smoothie with homemade boba. Late teens and carefree travel are behind me, but early 30s and delicious drinks on my porch beckon.
