A Bubble Fun stall sells Bubble Tea to local South Africans at the Temple Fair in Nan Hua Temple, SA. Picture: PEOPLE’S DAILY ONLINE/SISSY CHEUNG

For those who don’t know, bubble tea is a sweet milk tea, often served cold, filled with chewy tapioca balls or “pearls” that one drinks through an extra-large straw.

Bubble Tea originated in Taiwan in the 1980s and has since successfully made its way across the world to China, US, Australia, Europe and now SA.

Bubble tea distinguishes itself from the traditional Eastern tea drinking culture in two ways, making it more compatible with a fast- paced lifestyle. First, contrary to the emphasis on the warmth of tea in traditional tea drinking, bubble tea is often drunk cold, allowing for shorter preparation time and an available takeaway option to enhance consumer convenience. Second, bubble tea creatively incorporates chewy tapioca balls, whereas traditional tea drinking is particularly about the purity of tea.

Bubble tea is rarely sold in a cafe shop with seats and tables. It is primarily sold on the street and served in paper cups, sealed with an airtight plastic seal. The sealing machines are a marvel of modernity that can seal hundreds of cups in an hour.

The straws are sharpened at one end so that you can puncture the seal without making a mess. This means that milk tea is not designed as a social drink like coffee or traditional Chinese teas, but is designed to give one a quick pick- me-up while working or shopping.

Bubble Tea takes either the form of a fruity ice tea or a non-dairy “milkshake” tea. The unique and attractiveness aspect of this drink is the topping which can either be a vast choice of flavoured Popping Bobas, popping candy, crunchy biscuit bits, coconut jelly and grass jelly or tapioca pearls.

It’s not just about how a drink looks or tastes. It’s about how it feels in your mouth too.

Tapioca pearls are extremely yummy, chewy and are simultaneously a source of iron, calcium and vitamin C. Tapioca is a starch extracted from cassava root.

For a long time, in SA it was sold in snack bars in Chinatown, but there is much room for expansion of the customer base, according to the businessman who decided to sign a partnership with Taiwan’s leading tea brand CoCo Fresh Tea & Juice. The Taiwanese company has some 2,100 stores worldwide and is hoping to set up more bubble tea shops in SA. CoCo offers a menu of more than 30 drinks and customers can choose how much sugar to put in. It’s very common that a group of friends would sit down and discuss the flavours for half an hour before ordering.

(The story was originally published on Business Day on March 31st, 2016.)