Perth’s bubble tea boom, bringing cheese latte and taro root in a cup to the masses - for a price

It is the $3 billion drink with eyebrow-raising flavours such as chocolate cheese latte, cotton candy, and the lilac-hued taro root that can come with a whopping 400-calorie hit. Once as simple as iced-tea spiked with love-them-or-hate-them chewy tapioca balls, bubble tea has become a drink for the social media age that can be laced with anything from fresh fruit and syrup to lychee jellies and egg pudding. But step inside the world of bubble tea and it is clear that, far from being a niche product, Taiwan’s most famous culinary export is worth an estimated $3 billion worldwide and that figure is expected to double to $6 billion by 2027. And it has never been as big in Perth as it is right now. Drive down William Street in Northbridge and you can take a trip through Perth’s unofficial bubble tea capital. Devotees know where to find their favourite variety but a tip for the uninitiated is to look for the queues that form outside, often when special deals are on offer. Or turn to social media, where bubble tea aficionados run accounts dedicated to rating one cafe’s offerings against another and a drink that started as a humble cup of iced tea can increasingly resemble an elaborately coiffured dessert. Bubble tea has been in Perth for 20 years but the number of outlets has exploded in the past few. And William Street, while spitting distance from about a dozen bubble tea purveyors, is just the tip of an iceberg that extends across the metropolitan area and into just about every suburban shopping centre as well as the Curtin, Murdoch, UWA and Edith Cowan university campuses. “We saw other bubble tea shops were so popular with the long queues and everything so we thought we’d give it a try,” is how Teamorrow Australia’s manager Regina Luo describes the decision to open the William Street bubble tea cafe two years ago. Business has boomed, a fact Ms Luo credits partly to the cafe’s ever-changing menu of concoctions and partly to an Instagram-friendly interior that includes a display where customers are encouraged to take selfies. “We change it every few months,” she said. “Like for Christmas we put up Christmas lights ... we want customers every time to take a different photo of themselves and post it on social media so their friends will see it and come. “I think social media has played a very important role in the bubble tea business.” Bubble tea started nearly 40 years ago in Taiwan in the 1980s before spreading across Asia and into the western world, arriving in Australia in the 1990s and in Perth at the tail end of the decade. Perth’s first bubble tea store eventually became part of the Utopia chain, which now has 18 stores in WA. Utopia’s Kim Ong said the past couple of years had seen an “explosion in terms of the international brands joining the WA market”. There is no single recipe for bubble tea or boba, as it is known in some countries; just variations on a theme that is essentially iced tea made with black, oolong or green tea, heavy on the ice, with tapioca balls or “pearls” — the latter designed to be sucked through a wide straw. The drink’s name comes not from those bubble-like pearls but from the bubbles that form when the drink is shaken with ice. Over time the flavour options have expanded into the dozens and grown increasingly elaborate, fuelled in part by social media and the arrival of new players keen to differentiate themselves from the competition. The Bubble Boat Instagram account is one of several reviewing bubble tea around Perth. The account’s authors, who prefer to stay anonymous, said the growth of new bubble tea shops and new varieties had also brought higher prices. “We have noticed a definite increase in the price of bubble tea drinks with the new stores that have opened up,” they said. “Not only that, there seems to be a push for uniqueness of drinks, with some stores attempting to introduce new flavours to Perth’s bubble tea palate.” While prices start around $4.50 they can nudge $7 — or $17 for an alcoholic version at Lucky Chans. Ivan Chen, who brought the popular bubble tea brand Presotea to Perth 10 years ago, said while “special mix drinks” have their fans, the company’s best seller is more traditional. “Our number one seller is still the original milk tea with pearls,” he said. “You see a lot of very creative drinks ... I guess it’s a good element to add in so you can create more eye-catching drinks but it has to taste good as well. “It’s saturated (in Perth) but I think there’s still room to move for bubble tea drinking.” WHERE TO BUY IT Utopia: The brand that brought bubble tea to Perth has 18 stores around the metro area. Presotea: There are 16 stores around Perth, with a new one to open in Ellenbrook in September. Nobibi: An Instagrammer’s dream on William Street in Northbridge. King Tea: This Newcastle Street store will deliver bubble tea to your door. Teamorrow: One of the latest arrivals on Northbridge’s William Street strip. T4: This popular franchise has stores in Canning Vale, Victoria Park and Myaree. Lucky Chan’s Laundry and Noodlebar: Bubble tea is not the main game at this Northbridge restaurant but it does offer alcoholic varieties, like the bubble gum-flavoured “Hubba Bubbletini”, with pink gin and strawberry ‘pearls’. WHAT TO TRY Milk tea: A more or less traditional version of the drink. Brown sugar: Dessert in a cup and as delicious as that sounds. Cheese latte or cheese foam: An acquired taste that is a bit like cheesecake. Taro: Made from a potato-like tuber, this creamy and sweet variety can range in colour from brown to purple. Fruit flavoured: With popular flavours including passionfruit lemon and mango, these are more on the refreshing side. The add ons: Do not forget your toppings, which can include panda pearls, egg pudding, lychee jelly and oreos.