Beggin' for a piece of that bubble?

While I don't believe there is any doubt what Sir Mix-A-Lot was talking of when he wrote Baby Got Back, I couldn't help but think recently of my favorite line Mix-a-Lot's in trouble Beggin' for a piece of that bubble For I too have recently been craving a taste of Bubble. And I have Heidi to thank for helping cure my craving. Now before I get Heidi in trouble, or she punches me in the mouth, I need to explain. About a month ago, while prowling the Internet for recipes, I stumbled upon something called "Bubble Tea." Basically to make bubble tea, also called "boba," you need to get your hands on some monster tapioca pearls. It is at this point that most folks will stop reading. I had no idea how many people on Earth don't like tapioca. I happen to love tapioca pudding, cold or warm, but especially warm. It's yummy and fun. So rather than the tapioca pearls scaring me off, they lured me in. Since I don't drink coffee or tea of any kind, including the various Asian teas, I sort of lost interest after the part about the tapioca pearls. When we had finished eating our Korean barbecue, Heidi then wanted to go visit a local Korean Bakery called Shilla Bakery. Since I really had no idea there was such a thing I figured it would be interesting to see. On the way over she mentioned they made bubble tea, and I got excited. I figured if the Korean barbecue didn't kill me, then a little bubble tea wouldn't either. Shilla bakery was amazing. Just inside the front door are shelves upon shelves of Korean baked good. Personally the thought of a green bean pastry doesn't do much for me, but they seemed to be selling well. After a few minutes looking over the pastry selection it was time to get down to boba business. While scanning the menu I noticed that, in addition to coffee and tea types of drinks they also made very fruity drinks. The first one to catch my eye was "Sour Green Apple." I am a sucker for sour green apple flavored stuff. Green Jolly Ranchers and Midori sours are tops on the list. Oh I was hooked. We placed our order and went to grab a table that had luckily opened just as we started to look. The placed was packed even at 10 at night. After a few minutes our number was called and we went to retrieve our beverages. Heidi got a mocha type of drink. Mine was a neon green frozen Slurpee looking concoction with black tapioca pearls in the bottom. The pearls are about the size of a small grape. You also quickly notice the straw. It's huge. You could easily get your little finger stuck in the end of the straw. It has to be that big so you can slurp the tapioca up the straw along with your drink. Once I got back to Wilmington, I decided I simply HAD to find a place near here to get Bubble Tea. While we don't have nearly the Asian population of DC, I figured if bubble tea was as popular as I had been reading there simply had to be a place. Lucky for me, there is one place: "Pop Taste Bubble Tea Hut" in the Independence mall, just around the corner. I have already been once so I could get a few pictures (and of course get another sour green apple bubble tea!)You can barely see the 2" layer of tapioca on the bottom of the cup.Here you can vaguely see several of the black tapioca pearls as they slowly slide back down the straw. Depending on how deep your straw is in the cup will determine how much tapioca you get in each slurp. Once you've slurped up a few you chew on them for a bit. They have a gummy chewy texture and are very sweet, since they are usually covered with a sugar syrup. The best I can relate it is it's like tiny gummy bears at the bottom of a Slurpee.Here's a few of the tapioca pearls I dug up to the top of my drink. You'll notice they're not black anymore. Pop taste cooks the boba and serves them immediately. If they cooked them and then chilled them down slowly they would hold their black color better. Also, after a long time sitting at the bottom of my frozen drink they started getting harder. This is do the the particular variety of tapioca. You can find out ALL about Boba at Bubble Tea Supply who appear to be the Internet Kings of Bubble Tea supplies. I also saw that in addition to the boba they also have "jelly cubes" instead. I can only assume the jelly cubes would hold up better in the frozen drinks. I guess I'll just have to experiment. I suspect there's a few more trips to Pop Taste in my future. I would ask the lady behind the counter, but it is clear she doesn't really speak any English. So the bottom line, here, is for you to go out, find some Bubble Tea, and give it a try! It's way yummy! I mean even Sir Mix-A-Lot has been begging for some. You will, too!