I wanted to talk about the subject of my latest video piece again, a news package about bubble tea. I felt as if I couldn't fully explain what bubble tea actually was because I was more focused on the video aspect of the project. I feel like explaining what bubble tea actually was could help people understand more or inspire them to watch my new video! (Which will be up soon so keep checking my video page to watch!) Bubble Tea is this huge craze that has swept the world. I decided that along with my video, I’d make a podcast to inform people who have no clue what bubble tea is. Okay so basically bubble tea is tea mixed with milk or fruit and usually topped off with tapioca balls (boba). It was invented in Taiwan in the 1980s in the Chun Shui Tang teahouse. The story is that one day the owner named Liu Han-Chieh, decided to serve cold tea after seeing iced coffee in Japan. His product development manager, Lin Hsiu Hui, then one time decided to pour a dessert called fen yuan that she had with her into the drink, which created bubble tea. Since then, bubble tea has become a major hit. In America, it’s been around for longer than you probably think. It first came to the west coast of America in the 1990s. Bubble tea then became a huge fad in Taiwanese immigrant communities, and then a part of Taiwanese-American culture. Instead of fading out or just staying within the Taiwanese-American community (or even just Asian-American communities in general), the fad kept spreading across America. Now it’s more popular than ever within all communities. People often question how bubble tea spread so fast and was actually popular from just one tea shop that started to sell it. The answer mostly is change. To keep up with all the latest trends and interests, sellers of bubble tea changed it around to make it more appealing to us. They added so many flavors and toppings that just weren’t originally there. In my opinion, I'd probably not like it if these changes hadn’t’ve been made. Basically, the point is, that bubble tea is this huge trend that relies on change the most out of everything. Even the boba itself has changed. Originally, there was only one type of boba. They’re called tapioca balls. Tapioca balls are these super chewy dark brown balls that taste kind of neutral. They don't taste like anything really but the texture I feel like is the dominant characteristic of these little balls. The best way I can think to describe it is like an undercooked pasta texture like for the inside of these balls but the outside of the balls would feel more like how a majorly overcooked past would? I don't know if that’d make sense to anyone but thats the best way I can think of it. Only way to really know is to try it! Hint hint. Anyways, tapioca comes from something called a cassava root vegetable which is sometimes called a yuca that actually looks pretty freaky in its original form so my advice to you is not to look that one up. So that was tapioca but there’s also the “pop” boba that’s a bit more untraditional. Popping boba is around the same size as the tapioca balls but a totally different experience. Popping boba is this ball that has a thin, gel-like skin and has juice inside that bursts when you squeeze it or bite it. It’s pretty common to also get it in your frozen yogurt so lots of places like froyo offer it as a topping as well. Popping boba is a good alternative for kids and others who aren’t so fond of the strange texture of the tapioca balls. You can also always add a lot of other toppings including fruit. The last thing I wanted to add is where you can get this drink. The three best places in St. Louis are Share Sweet, Cube Tea Studio, and Corner 17. Share Sweet is good if you want to get a popping boba tea because the two others are more traditional and probably won’t have it there. Cube Tea Studio is this tiny shop with like two seats, but they have really good bubble tea that always has fresh ingredients. I even heard the owner travels to China occasionally and actually finds out the new trends there and brings it back for his store to make. The third place called Corner 17 is one I have never actually been to, but I’ve heard so many great things. Not only do they have good bubble tea but they also serve really good asian food there. hope this post helps you to understand what bubble tea really is and clears up some commonly asked questions. If anyone has any more questions comments are always welcome! I'd love to hear other peoples experiences with trying bubble tea as well. Thanks for reading!
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For my first project in Broadcast Technology 2, I looked for a more interesting topic that high school students would relate to. During a Ladue Publications meeting, my friend and fellow broadcast student, Maria, and I heard a story pitch about bubble Tea. We decided to roll with it and recruited another broadcast student, May, to help with this story. May is a frequent bubble tea drinker and knew exactly the right questions to ask our interviewees and what exactly to order to give them the full experience of first-timers trying bubble tea. For this News Package, it starts with an introduction of many different people mainly just telling us what they know about bubble tea and just to kind of give the viewers a sense of what bubble tea is and if people actually enjoy this drink. We just took many different people from lunch and asked a few basic questions about bubble tea like: "Do you know what bubble tea is?" or "Where is your favorite place to get bubble tea?" Along with using pieces of these answers in our video, we also listened to see which bubble tea places were mentioned the most. The two most mentioned bubble tea places students recommended were ShareSweet and Cube Tea Studios. They were both pretty close to eachother in the Olivette area, so May, Maria, and I set off with the amazing stars of our news package, Jackson and Lucy. When we got here, we filmed Jackson and Lucy trying bubble tea for the first time. This place was serving "pop" boba and they got to try pop mango green tea. They explained their thoughts and opinions of this new drink and soon after we were on to our next stop, Cube Tea Studio. At Cube Tea Studio, we ordered brown sugar milk tea with regular boba. This drink was actually one recommended by one of the students we interviewed during lunch. This drink was a bit less popular, although more authentic. Jackson and Lucy were great innterviewees and were very good at answering our questions completely. I'm really excited to see how our video turns out, we're almost done editing! I'm hoping this video gives the students at Ladue a look at what bubble tea is and tells them the best places to get bubble tea. I personally really like bubble tea and I know others would love to hop onto the craze as well. Keep checking my video page to watch our new video, it'll be up soon!
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September 2019
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