Only recently heard about this place and when a friend came into town, why not take the opportunity to visit? Plus, I heard of lines, so it had to be good, right?
I love milk tea and boba. I just don't get them as much as I'd like due to the caloric content of one of these babies. Having said that, I generally love the original flavored milk tea and this place seems to have a number of milk teas that only differ by the type of sugar used to sweeten them. After reading some reviews, I decided that I must try the Okinawa (roasted brown sugar) and my hubby got the Hokkaido (caramel toffee) to get something different. We almost got the Ginger, though. You get the choice of choosing your sweetness level and how much ice you want as well as any additions like pudding for an additional .50 cents, but do note that there is only one default sweetness to both the Okinawa and Hokkaido, but we could limit the ice. There also seems to be one standard size for the drinks. ...this was after we stood in line for around 15 minutes on a Saturday night at roughly 9 pm. Not too bad, but then you realize that after you place your order, you get a number and need to wait a little more for the drinks themselves.
The establishment is fairly large with tables and chairs and way too many people. Thankfully, our friend made it there early and snagged an entire table for us. A good thing: we were a party of 8. There was cute wall art on the walls, but despite the large number of customers milling around (some even brought laptops and were working while others were there just to chat), there were only 2 people making drinks. Ah, that explains the lines, then.... in addition to some invisible hype I was not privy to.
When we finally got our drinks around 5 minutes or so after we sat down (our numbers were announced, but depending on how distracted you are at the time and how many people are there that may affect noise levels, it can be missed so keep your ears alert). Despite how I couldn't choose the sweetness level, both drinks weren't too sweet (dare I say that it was just right?), which is a major plus. There were also definite flavor differences. I quite liked the Okinawa. Though it didn't have as strong a tea taste as I've had before, there was a definite tea flavor, so they get a passing score from me on that. The added dimension of the brown sugar was good. However, for the Hokkaido, I strangely also got undertones of coconut. Coconut? Yes, coconut. Both hubby and I didn't like it as much; I sort of wish I got the ginger instead. They aren't stingy with the boba, so that was good as well.
I usually feel pretty full after drinking a full cup of these bad boys (read: milk teas with tapioca), but that was not the case here. However, I did make three trips to the bathroom from all that tea content, since tea is a natural diuretic. I suppose this means they use a good amount of real tea. Overall, I like the flavor (nothing overpowering, though I'm still not sure about that coconut) and the flavor profile is there. They use what they say they do!
Next time, I'm curious about their ginger, taro, and matcha. I wonder if they use real taro as opposed to powder flavorings. I guess only time will tell. They do offer stamp/loyalty cards, which is nifty, because I'm one of those people who will return to get my card stamped.
With the place being so popular, the cleanliness outside was decent, but far from perfect. There were bits of straw wrappers on the floor and the trash can was overly full in that people started to line their ups on the countertop next to the trash can. Of course, this was shortly before they closed (yes, we stayed that long) so perhaps they were waiting until the last customer left before they tended to it. The restroom was (barely) passable. No toilet paper was installed on the dispenser; a half-used roll was laying on the floor and another partially used roll was propped on the dispenser. Sheets of paper towels were scattered on the floor. At least they still had soap and had paper towels in their respective dispensers.
All in all, I would like to try a couple of their other non-milk tea offerings before I make a final decision on their drink selections. Thus far, drinks are good, though I'm still not sure why the place has lines. It's good, but not that good. Perhaps my next trip will give me something that'll blow my socks off! Only time will tell... read more