Butterfly Pea Flower Bubble Tea

4.75 from 4 votes

A pretty and caffeine-free blue colored bubble tea you can easily make at home.

Prep Time2

Cook Time10

Total Time12

Course: Drinks

Cuisine: Taiwanese

Servings: serving (16 ounces)

Author: Jee Choe

Steep butterfly pea flower tea bags in ¾ cup of hot water for 5 minutes.
Set the temperature to 175°F if you're using an electric kettle with a temperature setting. Use filtered water if possible.
Discard tea bags and stir in brown sugar.
Set aside to cool.

Boil water and brown sugar in a saucepan. Add tapioca balls.
Combine ¾ cup of water and 2 tablespoons of brown sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Once you see big bubbles (2-4 minutes), add tapioca balls. Keep boiling for 8 more minutes on medium-high heat. Cool slightly, until tapioca balls aren't too hot to eat. They should still be very warm.

Put warm tapioca balls in brown sugar syrup into a cup.  Add ice, then the cooled down butterfly pea flower tea.
Slowly pour in half & half.
Serve immediately and stir before drinking. Use an extra wide straw to drink.

Slight cooled, very warm tapioca balls have the perfect soft and chewy texture. Just make sure the tapioca balls aren't too hot to eat or you'll burn your mouth.
Use tea bags instead of loose tea. Bubble tea is made with sugar and milk, so the subtle qualities of high quality loose tea gets lost in the sweet drink. Tea bags are also easier to clean up.
Any kind of milk can be used in this drink, including plant-based milk like oat milk or almond milk. But, I've found that if you want to create the pretty swirls, nothing creates them in the blue tea like half & half. Plus, they make the drink a lot creamier.
Butterfly pea flower tea can be steeped then stored in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. Don't add the sugar until you're ready to make the drink.
It's not recommended to make boba ahead of time since tapioca balls start to harden after 4 hours. It's best to make it right before you want to serve it.
Don't make more tapioca balls than needed since they can't be stored for later use.
Bubble tea is always served with a wide straw because that's the only way to get a few tapioca balls with each sip of the milk tea.