DIY: Bubble Tea Recipe (Asian Iced Green Tea Drink)

A short and sweet DIY this week! On Saturday I popped into our favourite Chinese Supermarket in Edinburgh and I spotted that they had tapioca pearls in stock. Since I discovered it a couple of years ago I've been totally obsessed with Bubble Tea and I can finally make it at home any time I want - YAY!
For anyone who's never heard of it, Bubble Tea is super popular in Asia (esp Japan) It's either made as a sweet iced green tea (often flavoured like Pineapple - my fave), or as a milk tea. Actually you can get these hot too, but I've only had it cold. These tea's are filled with either tapioca pearls or boba - balls that look the same as these but instead of being squidgy they burst when you bite them and they're filled with a sweet juice.
That's right, you're drinking juice with chewy balls in. It sounds weird, but it's awesome!!

So, for this recipe, you'll need some tapioca pearls (if I ever spot boba I will make another post!), a small cup, some green tea (I've opted for green tea with rose by Kusmi Tea, but I'm loving the salted caramel green tea by Twinings too) some honey (or sugar, honey is just a little better for you) and some giant straws (also picked up at my supermarket)

Before you make them, the tapioca balls are hard and look like this. According to the ones I bought, for every 1 cup of these, you need 10 cups of boiling water. As I'm not making it for the whole city, I only needed half a cup of balls, so just 5 cups of water.
All you need to do is boil the water in a pan over a high setting, and add the tapioca pearls in. Gently stir them until they start to become plump and start floating. Pop the lid over the pan and let them simmer on a medium heat for 5 mins. Once that's done, add in a couple of tablespoons of honey or sugar if you'd like to make them sweeter (they're kinda tasteless, but I don't mind that) Taste them to check if you need to add any more in - it's all down to preference.

Ready? Take them out of the water and set them aside... don't they look beautiful?
To make the sweet iced tea, boil up 4 cups of water in a pan and add 10grams of green tea (or 8 teabags). If you're using loose tea like me, use one of those tea steapers or a sieve so you can take it out easily! Simmer for 5 minutes and take the tea out. Give it a little taste and add 3-4 teaspoons of honey in to sweeten it to taste. Let it cool down and get your cups ready...

Such pretty bubbles!! Add in a couple of ice cubes and fill with your sweet green tea. I topped mine off with a little bit of lemonade to make it lightly fizzy too... that's not standard, I'm just super excited to try lots of new things with my favourite new ingredients!

I hope you have fun playing around with this recipe :D Some people love bubble tea and others think it's insane... I'm ok with that! But if you ever get a shot to try some of this stuff, I really think you should give it a go. You might surprise yourself (like I did!!)

Enjoy!
xox