DIY boba pearls for bubble tea using the Thermomix

Halfway through the circuit breaker, to curb the crowd who are still queuing for bubble tea, standalone dessert shops were declared non-essential and ordered to close. I don't fancy bubble tea, but all the teens from age 12 onwards till early twenties seem to be be addicted to bubble tea. And judging from the crazy rush before the shut down, people are seriously addicted!! The teens at home were trying to order their last cuppa through Grab and Food Panda but delivery services terminated orders for bubble tea early due to demand out-striping possible supplies. Desperate to continue drinking the occasional bubble tea, we scroll around town looking for the elusive tapioca flour, which like its other flour cousins started going out of stock everywhere overnight since the Circuit breaker kicked in!

Finally, when we gathered all the required ingredients, including black sugar (another hard-to-find ingredient), we (ya, I joined in the fun) started experimenting until we found the right combination and texture. Here's our tried and tested recipe + method. You can also use the stove, but it will be constant stirring.

 

Boba Ingredients

• Water 70g
• Black sugar (黑糖) 50g
• Tapioca starch 90g + extra for dusting
• Portion ~ 6 cups (depends on how much pearls you eat)

Thermomix Directions

1. 5min / 100c / add tapioca starch spoon by spoon from lid hole
2. Pour out on counter top, knead into small balls or strips, keep inside cling wrap so they do not dry up (the dough should be stretchy when you removed it from the mixing bowl)
3. Use dough cutter cut into long strips and further cut into small ball sizes
4. Stretch, pinch the dough until you get a nice little balls (TIP: we realised we get nicer balls through pinching than palm rolling)
5. Make sure they are dusted with tapioca flour so they don’t stick together
6. You may freeze dusted balls or cook them
7. Get 1.5kg water boiled in 100c with kettle mode
8. Once you hit 100c, switch to manual cooking around 18min/100c/reverse spoon with balls added into the mixing bowl from the lid hole
9. Remove when it’s times up (you should see the balls floating)
10. Drain with simmering basket
11. Add the balls into ice water
12. You may add them into sugar syrup or honey

TIPS

• Finish the bobas within the day as they do not keep well in the fridge and will become hard
• Flour dusted uncooked ones freeze well and taste almost the same when you cook them another day
• Add into any milk tea, soy milk, even clear jasmine green tea (yes, we’ve tried all variations 🤣 )

Black sugar syrup

• Water 60g
• Sugar (brown is black) 50g
• Cook until thickened without MC

Credits to : Stephanie Wong’s Thermomix method and Inga Lam’s recipe in her YouTube video