Bubble Queen

You take a long-time classic like “Milk Tea”, throw some tapioca balls (and then call them precious pearls) in there and thus, creating one of the most popular modern beverage in the last 15 years.   We call it simply ‘Bubble Tea’ – its existence permeates the lives of most Asians around the world.   Today, we present to you yet another bubble tea place.  This place is a bit different than others that we have visited.  Sure enough, it’s got your classics (Milk Tea, Taro, etc), but these guys (er….queens?)  at Bubble Queen surely put their minds in something different.

Looking from Cambie Street.  It’s kinda hidden but it’s there!

The view from the door.  Not that roomy but hey, I’m not sleeping here.

More internals.

The menu for the specialty drinks.  ENJOY!

Mango Slush!  Wendy’s long time favorites.  She says this is the second place aside from Bubble World that has the best tasting Mango Slush!  Bubble Queen had the option of adding mochi.  There was also a choice either the mini or full size pearls as well.  The drink had a strong mango flavour.  I like the fact that it was really smooth – either by adding more ‘cream’ ingredients or blending it longer.  The mochi + pearls paired up nicely.  The mochi were also cooked to order so they’re really soft and chewy.  They’re also sweetened so they don’t bland out the taste of the drink.  This is actually in the Specialty Slush section of their menu and costs $4.50.

A few days later, we were kinda hungry and did not plan to have a full dinner.  We gave Bubble Queen another try.  Wendy got the Green Tea Slush + mochi.  Meanwhile, I got the Cookies ‘n Cream Slush with pearls  (it is the drink behind the green tea, lol).  Furthermore, the Thick Toast with Taro spread was an additional I asked for.  The green tea was mediocre as the taste was not that strong – it was rather bland, probably due to the slushies.  However we found that once the ice has all melted, the taste was actually pretty awesome.  So next time maybe we’ll just have it in the tea form and not the slush form.

The Cookies ‘n Cream on the other hand was FANTASTIC.   It was almost like an ice cream smoothie with pearls (A++). The taste was there in full force.  There were just not enough words to describe how good this tasted.  AWESOME.

Now, the taro spread looks sh*t brown in the picture causing it to look like a piece of thick toast with sh*t spread – hmmm, so appetizing!  But I swear to you it’s just the sh*t phone camera.  It’s actually a dark rather appetizing purple.  Compared to other places, the thick definitely did not rank high.  The toast was a bit too big (yes, i know), and the taro was rather tasteless- sweet, but not much taste on the taro side.  Once it cooled the topping hardened to a chewy taffy.  I wanted to give up halfway but just didn’t wanna waste the food.

Most people that know me well know that I am a big fan of blueberries.  It was a great taste and is considered one of the healthiest foods in world.  Bubble Queen created the Blueberry Cheesecake as one of its selections.  I was a bit skeptical as I can imagine it may be difficult to finalize a drink that can have the distinct flavours of the blueberry and yet be creamy enough to simulate a cheesecake.   After more than 5 minutes of waiting, the drink I was destined to have arrived.  I was very satisfied with the product to say the least.  The blueberry was definitely there but the cheesecake part fell short of its mark.   However, the drink was awesome and I do recommend it.

This is THE drink for me.  I don’t think there is anyone on Earth that dislikes the taste of the almighty Malteser (if you don’t, please don’t talk to me).   Bubble Queen has decided to make it as one of their specialty drinks.  Rightfully so.  The drink does encapsulate the flavor of the famous candy and the mini pearls make it even better.  I HIGHLY recommend anyone to give this a try.

All in all, the drinks at Bubble Queen stand out.  Where it comes short is its slow service.  There would literally be ONE person ahead of us and we can sit and watch 10 minutes of TV (They have a LCD TV on the wall) before our orders are done.  Now, is it because these specialty drinks just take way too long? I don’t know for certain, but if they expect to be busy, they need to pick up the pace.  Despite all that, we will definitely return to Bubble Queen.

A word of caution though, as you can see in the Japanese Green Tea Slush picture, there’s a big mess underneath the cup on the napkin.  That is because the bubble lids they have NEVER SEALS the cups properly.  They’re loose and spill easily.  Just handle with  care if they give it to you in that cup, or, just ask them to thermal seal them.  They will do that anyways if all you asked for was pearls.

Summary

Reviewer

Heinz

Review Date

2009-10-10

What Was Reviewed

Bubble Queen

Author Rating

4