How To Make Tapioca Pearls (Boba Balls) With Perfect Texture For Milk Tea (2024)

Learn how to make tapioca pearls (boba balls) from scratch for bubble tea. Whether you like your boba pearls chewy, soft, 'Q' or firm, we'll show you how to achieve that perfect texture.

Homemade boba pearls are an absolute must if you love drinking bubble tea.

Making this bubble tea topping from scratch will give you control over the size, texture, and flavour. Something you won't be able to do with store-bought ones. Our recipe will show you how to make the perfect boba in under 30 minutes.

Based on our readers' feedback and the problems we've seen with other recipes, we've added more beginner-friendly tips to make our recipe fail-proof - no more oobleck, crispy-centred, mushy or hard boba pearls.

Ultimately, we'll also show you how to make tapioca pearls with different flavours using powders (like matcha and ube powder), fruit puree, and juice.

What are tapioca pearls?

Tapioca pearls (boba) are small, chewy balls made from tapioca starch. Typically, these spheres are black and used for bubble tea. However, these are also used in a wide range of cold summer desserts in Taiwan. Although boba has a gelatinous texture, no gelatin is used in creation. Therefore, this makes these small, chewy spheres vegan-friendly.

Boba is naturally semi-translucent and white. However, the process often uses black food colouring or dark brown sugar to achieve the familiar black colour. Black boba pearls were created for an aesthetic purpose to contrast with the colour of milk tea.

Boba is not the same as sago, a chewy ball used in Asian desserts. Sago is usually smaller in size and made from various tropical palm stems. It is used more widely across other Asian cuisines.

What is tapioca starch?

Tapioca starch is a gluten-free flour that comes from the cassava root plant. Tapioca flour is mainly known for making thick and chewy textures in dishes. The native South American plant arrived in Taiwan between 1895 and 1945, under Japanese rule.

What does it taste like?

Cooked by themselves, tapioca pearls have very little taste. These small spheres can be made with brown sugar or steeped in dark brown sugar syrup for a sweeter taste.

We would describe the texture of these tiny spheres as resembling that of jelly and gummy bears.

In Taiwan, the texture of boba pearls is referred to as Q or QQ. The term itself is hard to translate. However, it attempts to describe the mouthfeels of the soft yet resilient or bouncy texture. The high percentage of cassava root starch is the reason for this chewy texture. Other dishes described in Taiwan as Q include fish balls, mochi, taro balls, and tangyuan.

Ingredients

You will only need tapioca starch, water and brown sugar to make tapioca pearls.

Tapioca starch

For our recipe, we'll be using tapioca starch. In some countries, tapioca starch and flour often mean the same thing and are used interchangeably from brand to brand.

Brown sugar

Using dark brown sugar is a good way to sweeten the dough balls and get a dark brown colouring simultaneously.

You can also use light brown sugar or honey to create lighter-toned, golden boba instead.

You can also replace this with white sugar to make tapioca pearls. These will come out slightly translucent. However, we don't recommend entirely omitting the sugar. The sweet sugar helps bond the starch and hot water at the mixing stage, and it will be more difficult to form a dough without this. In addition, the tapioca pearls will be flavourless.

Using food colouring (optional)

Many recipes will call for black food colouring as this is a traditional method of making tapioca pearls. While there is no problem with using this, we understand some of you might be concerned.

Therefore, our tapioca pearls recipe won't use artificial food colouring. Instead, we will use dark brown sugar as a replacement. You can also use activated charcoal or natural food colouring dyes besides artificial food colouring.

How to make tapioca pearls at home

1. Add 6 tablespoon of water and dark brown sugar to a pot on low heat. You want to mix well and dissolve the sugar entirely in the boiling hot water. Make sure that there are no clumps before continuing to the next step.
2. Then, increase the heat to medium-high and let the mixture bubble. Once it starts to bubble, turn the heat off.
3. Add 2 tablespoon of tapioca starch to the hot mixture and mix using a spatula until a paste forms. You want to ensure that all the starch has been mixed well and there are no large clumps. Then, add more flour in 1 tablespoon increments to the mixture and mix well again. You want to repeat this process until you have used all the starch. Eventually, the paste will turn into a slightly sticky and tacky-like dough.
4. While the dough is still warm, transfer it to a flat surface sprinkled with the flour and then knead and roll the dough into a log shape. Divide the dough into 4 large parts to work on this one section at a time. Cover the remaining 3 sections with clingfilm to stop them from becoming dry and hard.
5. Take your dough and roll it out into a thin breadstick shape that is about 1-1.5cm thick.
6. Cut these into either 1.5cm by 0.5cm rectangular pillows or 1.0cm by 1.0 cm square pillows cubes using a dough knife or cutter. You can then shape these into a ball under 1.0 cm in diameter. As a tip, if you need two hands to roll the dough pillows into a ball, it may be too large to fit into a regular boba straw. Ideally, the pillows should be small enough to handle and roll them into a ball using just one hand. We only had to use our thumb and two fingers (index and middle finger) to squeeze and roll them into small balls.
7. Repeat for the remaining 3 parts of the dough. You may find the 3rd and 4th portions of the dough to become dry and crumbly. This is because as the temperature decreases and moisture gradually escapes the dough, it will harden it. To resolve this, microwave the dough at the lowest heat setting (our microwave is 90 Watts) for 30 seconds. The dough will soften and be easier to roll.
8. Once the entire dough has been made into tiny ball shapes, sprinkle enough flour to cover the balls and leave this to dry on a plate for at least 20 minutes. Over time, you may find that the surface of some of the balls will be moist, and the flour dusted over it has disappeared. This may be due to the internal moisture released from the balls. You should sprinkle more flour over the balls while drying them out.

How to cook tapioca pearls

Everyone loves their boba pearls differently. Some will prefer them soft outside but slightly resistant at the centre. Others might prefer the black boba made firm and al dente. Whatever it is, pay attention to the tips below on how to make tapioca pearls, which are the perfect texture for milk tea.

For 1 cup of boba pearls, prepare 8 cups of boiling hot water to cook them in. The 1:8 ratio with boiling hot water will allow each raw pearl to be evenly cooked and supple.

Cooking times for different textures and firmness

Altering the cooking time will change the firmness of the boba pearls. Here are timings to cook in hot water under medium heat:

• Firm texture: 6 - 8 minutes
• Chewy texture: 8 - 10 minutes
• Soft texture: 10 -15 minutes
• Very soft texture: 15 - 20 minutes

Then, for all, gently simmer under low heat for 5 minutes. For the gentle simmer, some people will say to simmer for even longer, 10-20 minutes, to further soften the pearls' core. We've tried it out, but there was little difference to us. Instead, if you simmer for too long, the external texture of the boba may start to disintegrate. In addition, you'll get less roundly shaped balls.

An ice bath is essential to get the QQ mouthfeel or bouncy texture. The cold water will immediately stop the cooking process and cause the boba to firm up slightly. The longer this is left in the ice bath, the firmer the boba. We recommend leaving it in the ice bath for 1-2 minutes only.

Alternatively, you can also run your bubble tea topping under cold water. This can significantly improve the texture and prevent the balls from sticking together.

If you want to cook the bubble tea topping but wait to serve it, we recommend submerging it in cool water for 2 to 3 hours. However, any longer than this timeframe will cause the outer texture of the boba to become overly soft as it sits in the water.

Cooking tips

Boba dough turned oobleck

There are two main ways you may accidentally form oobleck while making boba dough. The most common way is adding too much flour too soon to the sugar syrup mixture. When you do this, the starch particles suspend in the liquid mix rather than dissolve. This results in the unfortunate oobleck boba.

The other way you might end up with oobleck boba dough is when the temperature of the syrup mixture is low. We bring the syrup mixture to a boil to increase its temperature, which helps dissolve the flour to form a paste. It becomes more challenging for the two ingredients to incorporate at low temperatures, resulting in oobleck.

We recommend adding the starch in 1-tablespoon increments to prevent your boba dough from turning into oobleck. Mix it well with the syrup mixture until it forms a consistent sticky paste before adding more increments of the starch.

Cracked boba dough

Small cracks on your boba dough are fine and won't interfere with the cooking process or texture later. However, if the dough can not be rolled into a ball shape, you should reheat the dough using a microwave.

You can do so by putting the dough into the microwave on the lowest setting (90 watts) for 30 seconds. To avoid the dough cracking, you should cover any parts of the dough that you're not working on in some cling film to keep it moist.

Size

We recommend staying with 1.0 cm big (in diameter) starch pearls. As your bubble tea topping will likely increase in size once cooked. They are perfect alongside hot milk tea drinks like Royal Ceylon, Roasted Tea, and Classic Milk Tea. The pearls are also likely to maintain a great texture throughout.

Anything bigger than this size may not be suitable for cold milk tea drinks. This is because the bigger the homemade boba, the faster it will harden on the surface and lose its original consistency.

Smaller-sized pearls might be more suitable for cold or iced bubble tea, like fruit teas and fresh milk.

Once you're more confident, you can get creative and have some fun making boba at home. Change the shape and try cubes, diamonds, or even stars.

Just remember, when you're making tapioca starch balls in different shapes, this may change the cooking time required. So try to keep the size of your bubble tea topping relatively small and even. This will ensure that they will cook evenly.

Temperature

Temperature control is one of the key factors in getting the right consistency at the boba dough-making process. It's also important for the overall texture at the cooking stage.

Do not cook the tapioca pearls in harsh boiling hot water throughout. While it's tempting to cut the cooking time by boiling them throughout, it will result in unsightly pearls that are not round.

After bringing the water to a boil and adding the pearls, reduce the heat to medium-high heat. You want to cook the pearls in a medium-level simmer initially and then further reduce the heat to a gentle simmer later.

For small spheres that are soft on the outside and slightly resistant on the inside, keep the heat at medium-high to cook the outer layer of the pearls. Then, stew the boba on low heat to cook the centre.

Making them sweeter

You can adjust the sweetness of boba pearls by changing the amount of sugar used along with the tapioca starch or adding a syrup coating to steep them in.

You can change the type and amount of sweetener used with the starch. We like to use muscovado, the darkest version of dark brown sugar, for our recipe. They have a deeper sweetness than light brown sugar and white sugar. So, you can opt for the latter types of sugar if you want something less sweet.

Alternatively, you can reduce the amount of sugar used. However, be careful not to omit this sweetener from our recipe completely. The presence of sugar helps make the dough as it helps bind the tapioca starch with the syrup mixture. We recommend halving the amount if you want to cut the sweetness. If you still want to retain the appearance of these homemade boba pearls, make them using black food colouring.

The longer you steep the small spheres in sugar syrup, the sweeter they will be. For our recipe, we simmer the pearls in brown sugar syrup under medium-low heat for about 5 minutes.

Simmering helps infuse the brown sugar syrup into the boba pearls while further thickening the syrup. Avoid steeping it too long, as you might overcook the tapioca pearls and get a mushy texture.

While a thick brown sugar syrup for milk tea is certainly sinfully delicious, if it's overly thick, it will be difficult to suck through the straw.

How long will they last?

Cooked pearls will last 4 hours at room temperature. Refrigerated pearls can last up to 3 days. However, they will not retain their original texture. While it is possible to freeze boba, we don't recommend freezing as the cooked boba won't be soft and chewy. It is best to cook only how much you would like to use.

On the other hand, raw, uncooked pearls have a much longer shelf life. Dried pearls covered in tapioca starch can last 2-3 months if stored correctly. Dry it out after preparation before storing it in a container.

If they don't fully dry out, the moisture from the uncooked pearls may get released within the container, causing them to stick to one another and not last as long. Store in a cool, dry place and away from sunlight. Using an airtight container will help to prolong its storage life.

Is it healthy?

Boba pearls are made of starchy carbohydrates. This means that they are calorie-dense and can be hard to digest. There are few nutritional benefits but no adverse effects on health when you eat these in moderation.

However, some manufacturers might use colouring, thickeners and preservatives to prolong shelf life and appearance.

Fresh vs store-bought

The benefit of making tapioca pearls is knowing what ingredients are inside them. Also, you can customise it entirely by changing the texture and making unique flavours like mango boba or matcha pearls.

The disadvantage is the time it takes to make tapioca pearls. It takes us about 40 minutes to create 1 cup of tapioca pearls, which we will use for 5 to 8 servings. Getting the consistency right on the first few attempts is also tricky.

Store-bought boba pearls will guarantee a degree of texture and taste that resembles those at a bubble tea shop. Wu Fu Yuan is a brand we recommend and have used for many years. Their instant options cook in 5 minutes.

How to make tapioca pearls in different colours

Why stick to black or dark brown sugar? You can incorporate different flavours to make tapioca pearls using powder, fruit puree or juice.

The natural food colouring will give you lighter results. If you want to make tapioca pearls in all rainbow colours, we recommend using artificial food colouring.

For a visual demonstration, refer to our main recipe video, where we show you how to cook different colours at the end.

How to make matcha boba

• 100 g tapioca starch
• 50 g white sugar
• 90 ml (6 tbsps) water
• ½ teaspoon matcha powder

Method

The only difference to our main recipe is that you must first whisk the matcha. Using the same 90ml water, whisk the matcha powder until there are no more clumps and set aside. You can then follow the same steps in our recipe.

For a more robust green tea flavour, you add more matcha powder. Alternatively, you can steep the cooked pearls in brown sugar. Add these to your matcha bubble tea to create a monochrome bubble tea drink.

How to make tapioca pearls blue

• 100 g tapioca flour
• 50 g white sugar
• 105 ml (7 tbsps) water
• ¼ teaspoon blue pea powder

We add more water when using blue pea powder than our main recipe. We found that the powder absorbs more water, so more water is needed for making the dough.

¼ teaspoon blue pea powder will result in light blue pearls. Add ½ teaspoon for dark blue.

Ube or purple sweet potato boba

You can use ube, sweet potato, or taro milk tea powder to make tapioca pearls purple. Here are the ingredients you'll need:

• 100 g tapioca starch
• 50 g white sugar
• 90 ml (6 tbsps) water
• 1 teaspoon ube powder or sweet potato powder
• 1 drop of lemon or orange juice

Ube and sweet potato powder have colour pigments that give a vivid, purplish food colouring. However, these pigments are very sensitive to pH levels. In solid powder form, they are purple. Once you combine them with liquid, they may turn blue in neutral or higher pH levels (alkaline) or reddish in lower (acidic) pH. So, when you add pure neutral water, they will likely turn blue. That's why, in our recipe, we include a drop of lemon or orange juice to slightly lower the pH level to ensure it remains reddish purple.

White tapioca pearls with coconut milk

Making plain pearls with no coconut milk will result in semi-translucent pearls rather than white ones. Here's how to get milky white boba pearls.

• 100 g tapioca starch
• 50 g white sugar
• 45 ml water
• 45 ml coconut milk

Thoroughly mix coconut milk with water, then all the steps are the same as our main recipe.

Mango boba

Mango is great for popping boba and making tapioca pearls. These will naturally make a light yellow dough, but you can add food colouring to get a stronger colour.

• 100 g tapioca starch
• 50 g white sugar
• 30 ml (2 tbsps) water
• ¼ cup fresh mango (to make about 45 ml mango puree)

Method

1. Cut mangoes into cubes and add them to a blender with water. Blend until there are no clumps. Pour the mango puree into a pot through a sieve to remove most of the fibre and any remaining clumps.
2. In a pot, dissolve sugar in the mango puree and bring to a boil.
3. Once this has boiled, add tapioca starch in small increments.
4. Mix well and form into small balls. Instead of the amounts of mango puree and water listed, you can use 60ml of mango juice and 30ml of water.

Pink strawberry boba

The method is the same as the above. However, you'll need a ¼ cup of fresh strawberries instead of mango to make about 45 ml of strawberry puree.

Rose infused

• 1-2 teaspoons of rose syrup
• 100g starch
• 50g white sugar
• 90ml of water

Method

The steps are the same as the above. Adjust the amount of rose syrup used to change the flavour of the tapioca pearls. Add 1-2 drops of red food colouring to add a red shade. We don't recommend using strawberry as your food colouring here.

Other customisations

In theory, most fruits can be used in this recipe, especially in puree form. However, this fruit-infused boba recipe works best for tropical fruits like passionfruit, pineapple, lychee, and dragon fruit.

You can also use different flour mixes to change the dough texture. Try using sweet potato starch, cornflour, vital wheat gluten flour or even butter squash to change the texture of it. We recommend substituting 20% of the starch with cornflour or potato starch. This should give you a firmer, chewier dough texture in the centre. It will also make the small spheres harder to overcook in the process.

Where is it from?

Black tapioca pearls were first created as a cheaper alternative to sago. Milk tea with boba pearls was initially created in Taiwan during the 1980s. Milk tea was not an unfamiliar concept to the tea-drinking culture in East Asia. Meanwhile, using boba pearls in desserts was already a common practice. The combination of both naturally became popular when introduced as a cooling summer drink and snack.

Although the inventor of bubble tea is much disputed, two stores in Taiwan fight the claim of inventing the drink. Neither side won the patent lawsuit, allowing many vendors to adopt and sell their version of the beverage snack worldwide.

Why is bubble tea also called boba?

Boba can refer to the bubble tea topping alone or the milk tea drink as a whole. Interestingly, the term 波霸 (bōbà) in Chinese is slang for a woman with voluptuous breasts. The pearls were nicknamed boba as a gimmick for having larger chewy balls than all other competing stores.

The term was adopted by overseas Chinese who referred to the beverage as boba. This term was easier to pronounce than the Chinese term 珍珠奶茶 (zhēnzhū nǎichá). Today, the small black spheres are interchangeably called boba, pearls, bubbles, or tapioca pearls.

Please show us your homemade tapioca pearls by tagging us on Instagram. If you want more inspiration, try our brown sugar milk tea recipe.