Strawberry Popping Boba Recipe
Making strawberry popping boba with freshly blended strawberry juice is not a difficult process. With all the ingredients and a little practice, you will master it in no time.
Equipment
- Kitchen scale (with at least 1/10th of a gram precision)
- blender
- Glass bowl
- Syringe ( You can also use a dropper or drop the liquid with a spoon.)
Ingredients
- 200 g strawberry (Rinsed and destemed)
- 280 g coconut water (Or water)
- 40 g sugar
- 5 g sodium citrate (If you use coffee, soda, or other drinks that don't contain calcium to make the popping boba, you can skip the sodium citrate.)
- 5 g sodium alginate
- 1 liter clean water
- 5 g calcium chloride
- 200 g sugar (optional)
Instructions
- Add 200g strawberries, 280g coconut water (or water), 40g sugar, and 5g sodium citrate to a blender. Blend on high speed until smooth.
- Open the lid of the blender, add 5g sodium alginate to the strawberry puree. Blend on medium speed for 1 minute until the sodium alginate is fully dissolved.
- Pour the mixture to a bowl. Optionally, cover the bowl with food wrap and keep it in the fridge for 2 hours to overnight to allow any bubbles in the mixture to dissipate. (See Note 1)
- Add 5g calcium chloride and 200g sugar (sugar is optional, See Note 2) to 1 liter of cold water, whisk until fully dissolved (the water should turn transparent then).
- Dip the tip of a syringe (or a dropper) in the strawberry liquid, draw back the plunger to fill the syringe.
- Drop the strawberry liquid into the calcium chloride sugar solution, one drop by one drop. Let the droplets soak in the setting bath for 1 to 3 minutes. (See Note 3)
- Remove the strawberry popping boba from the setting bath with a strainer. Rinse them with clean drinking water to remove any residual calcium chloride and stop the setting process.
- Serve the strawberry popping boba with iced fruit tea or over ice cream or frozen yogurt.
Video
Notes
Note 1: I tried to skip the refrigerating step with my strawberry popping bobas. There were many tiny bubbles in my strawberry popping bobas, which caused them to float in my drink.
I made the coffee mixture the night before, and set it in the fridge overnight. As we can see, there is no tiny bubble in the coffee popping boba. The color turned out to be clearer. And they sank to the bottom of the drink.
In conclusion, the refrigerating step is unnecessary if you don't mind your popping bobas floating on the surface of your drink. If you'd like your popping bobas to look more transparent, you can refrigerate the mixture overnight to get rid of the bubbles.
Note 2: Dissolving sugar into the water can increase its density and help the caviar droplets maintain their shape. You don't need to be scared of this huge amount of sugar. You won't drink it. And it's okay to skip the sugar. You will just get some not-so-round popping bobas.
Note 3: The longer the droplets soaking in the setting bath, the thicker the skin will be. Larger droplets will take longer to form the skin. However, if you leave the small droplets in the setting bath for more than 3 minutes, they will turn into solid spheres with no liquid in the center.
You can test it by popping a boba between your thumb and index finger. Once the boba can hold its shape in your hand and burst out liquid when you pop it, it is good to be removed from the setting bath.
Note 4: I bought this popping boba kit from Amazon at about $20. The kit came with 50g Sodium Alginate, 50g Calcium Chloride, 50g Sodium Citrate, a syringe, and an instruction sheet. These ingredients are enough to make 17 cups of popping boba.