Tapioca 

                     Last week I went into a Taiwanese Cafe and over half of their menu were pearl drinks. There are many ways people call a pearl drink, some call it bubble tea or Boba-milk tea. The tapioca pearls are also know as Boba in some cultures. Most bubble teasrecipes contain a tea base mixed/shaken with fruit or milk,to which chewy Tapioca balls and/or fruit jellies are often added.



      Tapioca is a starch extracted from Cassava root, native to the North Region of Brazil, but spread throughout the South American continent. The plant was carried by the Portuguese and Spanish explorers to most of the West Indies, and continents of Africa and Asia, including the Philippines and Taiwan. It is now cultivated worldwide.

To use pearls they must be soaked well before cooking, in order to rehydrate, absorbing water up to twice their volume. After rehydration , tapioca products become leathery and swollen. processed tapioca is usually white, but sticks and pearls may be colored. Since old times, the most common color applied to tapioca has been brown, but recently pastel colors have been available. Tapioca pearls are generally opaque when raw, but become translucent when cooked in boiling water.

Pearl tapioca is a common ingredient in Asian desserts such as falooda, kolak, sago soup, and in sweet drinks. Large pearls are prefered in drinks. These large pearls most often are brown not white(and traditionally are used in black and green tea drinks), but today pearls are available in a wide variety of pastel colors. So have fun and enjoy something new you never know you what you are going to like until you try.       
                                                       

Falooda