I have a coworker/friend who is really into bubble tea/boba, so we often (pre-pandemic) go out for bubble tea together and compare notes a lot; I’ve been in close contact with her since the shut down but until this week I hadn’t seen her for over two months. In fact, the last day I saw her was my birthday in March because that was the last day our office was completely open before everyone (but the lab team) started working from home…
She had to stop by the office earlier this week to pick some stuff up from her desk though, and so we had a good distanced chat (it was so nice seeing her in person!) and she dropped off some matcha candies she’d picked up over the last two weeks as well as this instant bubble tea mix from a bubble tea shop very close to her house.
In the past, she’s shared instant milk tea/bubble tea with me before and to be completely honest they are usually BAD; but I still appreciate the share! I love trying different things, even if I don’t end up liking them. You still learn from the experience, after all.
This seems to be trying to replicate the “Royal No. 9” from The Alley’s core menu – which is a blueberry milk tea. I’ve actually had that one before, so I can draw some comparisons between the two. Obviously I don’t expect them to be the same; there’s a huge difference between milk tea made fresh in house and what you can get in an instant bag format. What surprised me though was actually though I thought this was more flavourful, which is the opposite direction I would have predicted? With that richer blueberry and black tea flavour, however, came a TON of sweetness that I wasn’t into so I’m not sure that the trade off was totally worth it? However, it wasn’t even close to falling in the camp of being revolting which is a huge step up from most of these types of instant milk teas that I’ve tried.
Would I buy it for myself? No, I’ll stick to the fresh thing. I see the appeal though!
I didn’t know The Alley did instant tea bags.