Although boba, lychee jelly, and popping pearls aren’t for all taste palates, the plethora of flavor combinations Popping Avenue Boba Tea offers is the ultimate menu for anyone with varying tastes. It's located at 5091 North Fresno Street, a block away from Shaw, near Fashion Fair Mall. Popping Avenue’s K-pop vibe, quick service, and happy hour special are worth a visit. The convenient wall-mounted T.V. menu of a ridiculous number of flavors and combinations of fillers made me decide to try each and every one of Popping Avenue’s options, and I haven’t been disappointed yet; just weirded out a few times. As mentioned earlier, it’s not for everyone, but if attempted enough times, the experience is more enjoyable, and the flavors and textures may develop in you something akin to addiction.
What is boba anyway, where did it come from, and what’s with the big straw? The spherical globs of chewiness are made of tapioca (starch from the cassava root) and originate from Taiwan. In 1949, Chang Fan Shu, a former bartender, took some cold tea and a martini shaker, shook that shaky drink, and created a foam-topped tea which Tu Zonghe, an entrepreneur in the 1980s, would later add tapioca pearls to--teeny tiny tapioca pearls. People drank that stuff up, and the recipe evolved into something bigger, well, the boba pearls, that is, which needed a bigger straw, thus giving rise to the iconic boba straw. From there, lychee jelly, popping boba, fruit, milk, dairy-free milk, and so much more have been tasted, tested, and tried by millions the world over, making boba tea a favorite among many.
Work Cited
McNamee, Gregory Lewis. "Bubble Tea." Encyclopedia Britannica, 5 Apr. 2023, https://www.britannica.com/topic/bubble-tea. Accessed 15 August 2023.