Brown Sugar Bubble Tea

Brown Sugar Bubble Tea: Step by Step

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1. Bring the 2 litres of water to a rolling boil and drop in the tapioca pearls. Stir once so they do not stick.

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2. Boil for 25 minutes, uncovered, stirring occasionally. The pearls will float within a couple of minutes.

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3. Turn off the heat, cover the pan, and leave them to rest for 25 minutes. This is what cooks the centres through.

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4. Meanwhile steep the tea in the just-boiled water for 5 minutes — you want it strong enough to stand up to milk and ice.

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5. Strain the tea and chill it thoroughly.

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6. Dissolve the brown sugar in the 100 ml of water over low heat and simmer 3 minutes into a syrup.

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7. Drain the pearls, rinse briefly under cold water, and tip them into the warm syrup. Leave them to steep at least 20 minutes.

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8. Spoon the syrupy pearls into the bottom of tall glasses, swirling the glass so syrup streaks the sides.

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9. Add ice, pour over the cold tea, then top with the milk so it clouds down through it. Serve with a wide straw.

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Related guide: Prep, cook and total time.

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Things to Watch For

1. Boil, then rest covered. Skipping the rest gives you pearls with hard white centres.
2. Eat them within about four hours. Refrigerated tapioca goes hard and cannot be revived.
3. Brew the tea much stronger than you would drink it — ice and milk are about to dilute it heavily.

The Short Version

Tapioca pearls are boiled and then rested off the heat in the covered pan, which lets the heat travel to the centre without the outside disintegrating — boiling them the whole time gives a mushy exterior and a chalky core. They are then steeped in syrup, which both sweetens them and keeps them from hardening as they cool.

What to Serve It With

Taiwanese popcorn chicken · A hot afternoon · Anything, honestly

Leftovers

Cooked pearls last 4 hours at room temperature and do not refrigerate well. Brewed tea keeps 3 days.

Questions People Ask

What's in a Serving

Per serving, an approximate calculation from the ingredient list. Treat it as a rough guide: an ingredient listed without an amount is not counted, so the figures run low. How the figures are worked out.

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