After trying so many failed boba making methods, I finally found this brown sugar boba making method that has a 99% success rate!
Brown Sugar Boba Tea
Originating in Taiwan, boba/bubble tea has been a popular sweet treat all over the world for years.
The special chewing experience of the sweetened tapioca pearls makes boba tea much more fun to drink.
In this recipe, I will show you how to make chewy brown sugar boba with its classic brown sugar syrup, and the most special and eye-opening air fryer milk tea~
Brown Sugar Boba Troubleshooting
Brown sugar boba could be one of the easiest desserts you can make at home.
It only requires 3 ingredients: brown sugar, water, and tapioca starch.
As long as you have learned how to roll a ball using piece of playdough in kindergarten, you should be able to make brown sugar boba at home.
However, there are some details requiring some extra attentions.
And these could be the reasons why you failed on making boba pearls at home:
1. Oobleck boba dough (no liquid, no solid)
Oobleck is a non-Newtonian fluid, which it’s a very strange texture between solid and liquid.
Specifically, when you gently hold the oobleck boba dough, it will flowing slowly between your fingers like liquid. However, when you try to knead the dough by pressing or squeezing it, you will feel that the oobleck dough is like a hard solid.
– What is the cause of oobleck boba dough?
According to Science World, oobleck happens when “the starch does not dissolve, but remains in suspension”. When we move the mixture slowly, the particles slide past each other, so the dough feels like liquid. When we “move it quickly, and the particles tangle with each other so that the mixture hardens”.
Therefore, when we add all the tapioca starch to the water all at once, or when the water is not hot enough, some starch particles won’t get a chance to be dissolved, they will be floating around in the water, in this way we will get an oobleck boba dough.
To avoid the formation of the oobleck dough, we will need to make sure:
- The water is boiling instead of simmering when we add in tapioca starch. In this way the starch particles will be dissolved in hot water immediately, instead of floating in cold water.
- Add a small portion of the tapioca starch to the boiling water, stir and cook until the mixture is thickened, so that there is no liquid water in the pot. Then turn off the heat, and knead in the rest of the starch. In this way, the second portion of the tapioca starch won’t get a chance to “meet” liquid water, so that they won’t be floating around.
2. Clumpy boba dough
When the tapioca starch is cooked too fast, your boba dough might be partially over cooked and partially clumpy.
To avoid it from happening, we need to add the tapioca starch in 2 times:
First, add 2 tbsps of the tapioca starch to the boiling water, stir and cook until this portion of the tapioca starch is fully cooked.
Then turn off the heat, remove the pot away from the hot burner, then add the rest of the tapioca starch to the pot. In this way, we will have enough time to mix in the second portion of the tapioca starch without worrying about over cooking the tapioca dough.
P.S. I found it’s less messy using a spatula than an egg whisk to mix the boba dough!
It’s totally fine if you can’t fully mix in all the tapioca starch with a spatula. We will need to knead the boba dough by hands anyway.
3. Sticky boba
– If the boba dough is sticky.
It’s possible that you need to knead the dough for a longer time to mix the dry part and the sticky part.
It’s very unlikely, but if the dough still feels sticky after 3 minutes of kneading, you can add some tapioca starch to the dough, 1 tsp at a time.
– If the boba peals stick to each other before cooking.
This boba dough should not be sticky, therefore you don’t have to coat the boba pearls with tapioca starch.
However, if in any case your boba pearls feel sticky, or you are not going to cook them right after making them, you can lightly dust them with tapioca starch and keep them in a food storage bag or an air tight container.
You can store uncooked bobas in the freezer for up to 2 weeks. And you don’t need to thaw them before cooking.
– If the boba is sticky after cooked.
That’s why we cool down the boba pearls immediately in ice water after they are cooked.
The ice water can wash off the sticky slimy substance around the boba pearls. At the same time, the boba pearls will be chewier after shrinking in ice water.
BUT... Don’t boba pearls turn hard once they are cold?
Yes, that’s why we should finish our boba cold drink as early as possible, and never store cooked boba pearls in the fridge.
The ice bath here will only cool down the surface of the boba pearls. The boba pearls will still be soft and chewy as long as the inner part is still warm.
And we will boil them in brown sugar syrup later anyway, so they will be softened again.
4. What can I use instead of tapioca flour for boba?
Theoretically, it’s okay for you to use cornstarch, potato starch, sweet potato starch, or glutinous rice flour to replace tapioca flour. However, boba made from these ingredients are not going to be as chewy as tapioca boba.
I have tried to make boba with cornstarch. See the detailed recipe and comparison between cornstarch and tapioca boba in this post.
How to Make Milk Tea for Boba Tea
Does your homemade boba tea taste bland and watery?
You may want to try my air fryer milk tea hack.
To make Air Fryer Milk Tea, you simply mix tea leaves, water, and sugar (both cane sugar and brown sugar are fine) in an air-fryer-safe bowl. Mix them well to make sure that all the tea leaves are moistened.
Air fry the mixture at 380 °F for 5 minutes, until there are some caramel color bubbles.
With this step, we will be able to dissolve the tea flavor into water within a short period of time. At the same time, we are roasting the sugar to create a caramel taste.
Then add milk or soy milk to the mixture, air fry at 360 °F for 10 minutes. In this way the tea flavor will be dissolved into milk.
You may observe a brown film on the surface of the air fried milk tea. That’s totally fine to eat, and actually full of flavor. Simply stir the milk tea with a spoon and let the milk film dissolve into the milk tea.
Pour the milk tea through the strainer to filter out the tea leaves. Then pour the hot milk tea directly over a glass of ice cubes to get iced milk tea.
What if I don’t have an air fryer?
You can also make creamy and flavorful milk tea with evaporated milk or freeze distilled milk.
Check out my freeze distilled milk tea recipe here.
EQUIPMENT for making brown sugar boba tea
- Air Fryer (optional, it’s for making “air fryer milk tea”.)
INGREDIENTS for making brown sugar boba
- 90 g water
- 40 g dark brown sugar
- ¼ tsp black food coloring (optional)
- 110 g tapioca starch
INGREDIENTS for making brown sugar syrup
- ½ cup dark brown sugar
- ½ cup water
INGREDIENTS for making milk tea
- 2 tbsp black tea (I used Ceylon tea. You can also use English breakfast tea, early grey, or oolong tea.)
- 2 tbsp water
- 3 tbsp sugar (can use brown sugar or white sugar)
- 3 cup milk (or soy milk)
- ice cubes
INSTRUCTIONS
– To Make Brown Sugar Boba
1. Add 40g brown sugar, 90g water, and 1/4 tsp of black food coloring (optional) to a nonstick saucepan. Stir and bring to a boil over medium heat.
2. Once the mixture is boiling (make sure it’s “boiling” instead of “simmering”), add 2 tbsps of the tapioca starch to the saucepan. Mix well with a spatula (do not use a whisk) until the mixture is thickened – there should be no dry powder or watery liquid in the saucepan, the mixture should look like slime. Turn off the heat.
3. Add the rest of the tapioca starch to the saucepan. Mix roughly with a spatula. Transfer the dough out to a kneading mat, or countertop covered with plastic food wrap.
4. When the dough is still hot, knead the dough for about 3 minutes until it turns smooth. (It might look dry at the beginning, but DON’T add water to the dough. While the surface looks dry, the inner part is wet and sticky. We need to knead the dough until the dry part and the wet part are well combined.)
5. Use a rolling pin to roll the dough into a ¼ inch thick square sheet. Cut ⅓ inch strips in one direction, then cut ⅓ inch strips in the perpendicular direction. In this way you will get some ⅓ inch x ⅓ inch x ¼ inch small cubes.
6. Cover the brown sugar boba dough with a piece of food wrap to prevent it from getting dry. Take one of the cube dough, place it between your palms, then roll it into a small ball. (I found it’s easier to roll bobas with my palms instead of my fingertips.) Repeat until you have rolled all the cube dough into bobas.
7. In a medium size pot, boil half pot of water over medium-high heat. Add the bobas to boiling water. Stir gently to prevent them from sticking to each other.
8. Once the water is boiling again, turn heat to medium-low, cover the pot with a lid, simmer the bobas for 20 minutes.
9. 20 minutes later, transfer the bobas to a large bowl filled with ice water.
10. Add ½ cup of brown sugar and ½ cup of water to a saucepan, stir and bring to a boil over medium heat.
11. Drain the bobas from the ice water with a slotted spoon, add the bobas to the boiling brown sugar water. Stir constantly to prevent sticking, cook over medium heat for 3 to 5 minutes until the brown sugar water is thickened into a syrup texture.
12. Transfer the bobas with the brown sugar syrup to a bowl. Set aside at room temperature (the bobas will turn hard in the fridge). Consume within 6 hours.
– To Make Milk Tea
1. Add 2 tbsps of black tea leaves, 2 tbsps of water, and 3 tbsps of cane/brown sugar to an air fryer safe bowl. Stir to make sure that all the black tea leaves are moistened.
2. Air fry the mixture at 380 °F for 5 minutes, until there are some caramel color bubbles.
3. Add 3 cups of milk/soy milk to the bowl. Air fry at 360 °F for 10 minutes. The bowl should be less than 80% filled to prevent the milk tea from spilling.
4. Place a strainer over a pouring cup, pour the milk tea through the strainer to filter out the tea leaves.
– To Assemble Nrown Sugar Boba Tea
1. Place 4 tbsps of brown sugar boba with brown sugar syrup into a tall glass.
2. Tilt and rotate the glass to coat the inside wall of the glass with a layer of brown sugar syrup, so that this cup of drink would look “dirty” but appetizing. (That’s why we call it “dirty milk tea” in Chinese.)
3. Fill the glass 70% full with ice cubes. Pour the hot/warm milk tea directly over the ice cubes.
4. Stir and enjoy using a boba straw.
5 other popular bubble tea toppings
1. Taro Mash
The taro chunks are boiled until soft, mashed, then sweetened with condensed milk. Together with the milk tea, the creamy and sweet taro mash will flow smoothly through the straw.
If you can’t find taro mash bubble tea in your nearby boba shops, this is how to make taro mash for your bubble tea at home:
1. Cut 150g taro into 1-inch cubes. Put them into a small saucepan.
2. Add water to 500ml. Keep the lid half-opening to prevent from overflow. Bring to a boil.
3. Boil over medium low heat for 45 minutes.
4. Drain the water, use a fork mash the taro, stir in sweetened condensed milk (can be substituted with sugar and milk) to your taste.
5. To serve, add about 4 tbsps of taro mash to the bottom of the cup, fill with milk tea and ice.
2. Grass Jelly
Grass jelly, also known as herb jelly, is created by using the Platostoma palustre plant. It’s a vegan friendly jelly. These black diamond like herb jelly can add a very special chilling, refreshing, and slightly bitter taste to your bubble tea.
I was a such big fan of Meet Fresh‘s Icy Grass Jelly Signature when I was in China.
If you can’t find a Meet Fresh store nearby, you can also easily make grass jelly at home with grass jelly powder:
- Stir and dissolve 25 grams of grass jelly powder with 100 ml of cold water.
- Boil 400 ml of water in a kettle cooker or in a saucepan, pour grass jelly mixture into the boiling water. Stir constantly over medium low heat until the mixture completely dissolved into a clear glue-like solution. Add sugar to your taste.
- Pour the hot mixture into a square container, cool off to room temperature. Cover the container with the lid or food wrap, keep in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
- Use a small knife to slice the grass jelly into cubes. Add to milk tea to make grass jelly milk tea.
3. Mini mochi balls
Chewy texture balls are just perfect for bubble tea. It could be boba made with tapioca starch or mini mochi balls made from rice flour.
You have probably noticed that these colorful mini mochi balls look like a smaller version of tricolor dango – Itachi Uchiha’s favorite snack.
You can make them with sakura and matcha powder by following my tricolor dango recipe. But you might have to spend an extra hour on rolling them into balls which are small enough to flow through the straw.
4. Red bean
My favorite topping for hot bubble tea is red bean. You can simply add some red bean paste to your milk tea to make red bean bubble tea.
Keep it in mind that red bean paste could be very sweet. You can actually use it to sweeten your milk tea. If your milk tea is already sweet enough, adding extra read bean paste could make it too sweet.
5. Lychee coconut jelly
Although I personally think lychee coconut jelly is too sweet, it has been Mr He’s favorite bubble tea topping all the time. Mr He insisted that I should introduce this topping to everyone.
So, may I have your attention everyone?🙋♀️
This is lychee coconut jelly. This is super sweet. That’s all I want to say about it~💁♀️
Thanks for your attention. 😁
My other Boba & Tea recipes you will also like:
Brown Sugar Boba Tea – How to Make Boba & Milk Tea
Equipment
- Nonstick saucepan
- Kitchen scale
- Air Fryer (optional, it's for making "air fryer milk tea".)
Ingredients
For making brown sugar boba
- 90 g water
- 40 g brown sugar
- ¼ tsp black food coloring (optional)
- 110 g tapioca starch
For making brown sugar syrup
- ½ cup brown sugar
- ½ cup water
For making milk tea
- 2 tbsp black tea
- 2 tbsp water
- 3 tbsp sugar (can use brown sugar or white sugar)
- 3 cup milk (or soy milk)
- ice cubes
Instructions
To Make Brown Sugar Boba
- Add 40g brown sugar, 90g water, and 1/4 tsp of black food coloring (optional) to a nonstick saucepan. Stir and bring to a boil over medium heat.
- Once the mixture is boiling (make sure it's "boiling" instead of "simmering"), add 2 tbsps of the tapioca starch to the saucepan. Mix well with a spatula (do not use a whisk) until the mixture is thickened – there should be no dry powder or watery liquid in the saucepan, the mixture should look like slime. Turn off the heat.
- Add the rest of the tapioca starch to the saucepan. Mix roughly with a spatula. Transfer the dough out to a kneading mat, or countertop covered with plastic food wrap.
- When the dough is still hot, knead the dough for about 3 minutes until it turns smooth. (It might look dry at the beginning, but DON'T add water to the dough. While the surface looks dry, the inner part is wet and sticky. We need to knead the dough until the dry part and the wet part are well combined.)
- Use a rolling pin to roll the dough into a ¼ inch thick square sheet. Cut ⅓ inch strips in one direction, then cut ⅓ inch strips in the perpendicular direction. In this way you will get some ⅓ inch x ⅓ inch x ¼ inch small cubes.
- Cover the brown sugar boba dough with a piece of food wrap to prevent it from getting dry. Take one of the cube dough, place it between your palms, then roll it into a small ball. (I found it's easier to roll bobas with my palms instead of my fingertips.) Repeat until you have rolled all the cube dough into bobas (See Note 1 below).
- In a medium size pot, boil half pot of water over medium-high heat. Add the bobas to boiling water. Stir gently to prevent them from sticking to each other.
- Once the water is boiling again, turn heat to medium-low, cover the pot with a lid, simmer the bobas for 20 minutes.
- 20 minutes later, transfer the bobas to a large bowl filled with ice water.
- Add ½ cup of brown sugar and ½ cup of water to a saucepan, stir and bring to a boil over medium heat.
- Drain the bobas from the ice water with a slotted spoon, add the bobas to the boiling brown sugar water. Stir constantly to prevent sticking, cook over medium heat for 3 to 5 minutes until the brown sugar water is thickened into a syrup texture.
- Transfer the bobas with the brown sugar syrup to a bowl. Set aside at room temperature (the bobas will turn hard in the fridge). Consume within 6 hours.
To Make Milk Tea
- Add 2 tbsps of black tea leaves, 2 tbsps of water, and 3 tbsps of cane/brown sugar to an air fryer safe bowl. Stir to make sure that all the black tea leaves are moistened.
- Air fry the mixture at 380 °F for 5 minutes, until there are some caramel color bubbles.
- Add 3 cups of milk/soy milk to the bowl. Air fry at 360 °F for 10 minutes. The bowl should be less than 80% filled to prevent the milk tea from spilling. (See Note 2 below)
- Place a strainer over a pouring cup, pour the milk tea through the strainer to filter out the tea leaves.
To Assemble Nrown Sugar Boba Tea
- Place 4 tbsps of brown sugar boba with brown sugar syrup into a tall glass.
- Tilt and rotate the glass to coat the inside wall of the glass with a layer of brown sugar syrup, so that this cup of drink would look "dirty" but appetizing. (That's why we call it "dirty milk tea" in Chinese.)
- Fill the glass 70% full with ice cubes. Pour the hot/warm milk tea directly over the ice cubes.
- Stir and enjoy using a boba straw.
Video
Notes
The recipe looks amazing but it didn’t work. It was really dry and I measured my Ingredients perfectly . There was still so much starch that didn’t mix in and it was crumbly and dry.
Pretty dry if you followed the recipe, I boiled some more hot water and added it occasionally to the dough while kneading to combat that dryness.
Nice recipe but it was dry. I measured perfectly. There as so much else’s starch that wouldn’t mix in and it was crumbly.
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THESE TASTE AMAZING. the boba consistency isn’t great, too chewy and not firm enough for me, but boiling them in brown sugar water makes them taste SO GOOD.
also i used 3/4 cup of tapioca starch and they weren’t too dry like the other comments are saying
The pearls turned out great but my milk tea exploded in the air fryer
I’m a chef, but I’m not an expert on bobba. This mixture was too dry, although the recipe said it will be dry, so I went against the rule and added a few tsp of water. When rolling the balls, the dough was so dry, I had to re-knead (if thats a word) the dough with more water. The pearls took almost 30 min to boil (had to boil it twice), not 25, and I kept them in the water for 15 min as most bobba recipes require. I know the authentic Taiwanese method for preparing the syrup with the pearls and this recipe didn’t mention it, it lacked that strict authenticity that I always look for. Even though I’m not keen on this , I still felt something was wrong. Reason why I commented, was because the recipe claimed to be full proof , after being tested many times. Leaves me with doubt.