1995: A FIRST TASTE OF BUBBLE TEA
Late one Sunday morning about 15 years ago, I emerged from my apartment with a very happy but slightly hung-over Evelyn – my then beloved and wonderfully fashionable significant other of two years (see IMAGE 2). She had been talking excitedly for some days about a great new café that had opened up a few blocks away from the Hengshan Hotel in Shanghai’s Xuhui District.
Evelyn had decided: that morning was the time to go. We had our mission for the day. So, off we went…
After hopping off the taxi, we stepped into an incredibly spacious tea house filled with really tasteful wood-work walls and flooring. The café’s gigantic windows faced the rising sun in the East, allowing ample Sunday morning sunlight to flow in and warm my happily hung-over bones.
As I pored over the menu selection written in Chinese hieroglyphics, Evelyn elucidated that this particular café was different: it specialized in a drink I had never tried up to that day – “bubble tea” – also known in Mandarin as boba nai cha. Literally, “tapioca milk tea” (Chinese code: 波霸奶茶).
It was great stuff. In its standard form, it is made of brewed dark green tea with a spot of sugar and a generous wallop of regular cow’s milk. This motley mixture was then blended up and poured into a glass containing some ice and a few spoonfuls of black tapioca “pearls”. Served with a smile, it bore a trademark gigantic straw that would make McDonald’s big straws turn green with envy.
The drinker of this beverage has not only had the pleasure of drinking this semi-sweet blend of traditional tea and frothy cow juice, but also will enjoy sucking up and chewing on a few of those gigantic dark tapioca “pearls” (very chewy). These drinks came in a variety of flavors – in some bubble tea houses, I’ve seen as many as 100 flavors or blends – with almost as many colors to match.
Later on when I became a connoisseur of this beverage, my favorite flavor was taro – a potato-like vegetable that’s blended up and served with a load of tapioca pearls on the bottom. Yummy!
Back then: my first taste of boba nai cha, basking in a most beautiful Sunday morning sunlight, during what was perhaps Shanghai’s most pleasant days of innocence…
But, last night…
INDY’S FIRST TAIWAN-STYLE“BUBBLE TEA” JOINT
At the behest of my dear friend and former Taiwanese roommate, Ta-Chien, last night I believe I just visited what I think is Indianapolis’s first “bubble tea” house. I was hoping this could have been a significant cultural event for Indy, but – as you’ll see soon – a crashing disappointment instead.
Taiwan Tea House’s doors were first opened perhaps two weeks ago by a certain Mr. Lee – a man both Ta-Chien and I used to speak with frequently while he was formerly a waiter of the now-defunct Forbidden City buffet in Castleton.
Taiwan Tea House is pleasing enough to the eyes. Done up with soft furniture in natural wood tones and cheerfully bright lighting, the interior of this café-restaurant looks the very zippy likeness of any other Taiwan-style tea joint you would find in the larger Chinatowns in America.
But unfortunately that is where an otherwise pleasant first impression ended.
SERVICE: CRAP WITH AN ATTITUDE
My buddy Ta-Chien and I waited about 20 minutes until we finally had to flag down a brusque and somewhat unpleasant waitress, apparently Mr. Lee’s younger sister. At this point we hadn’t even been handed our menus yet. Finally, after we did get a pair, Younger Sister – apparently feeling it under her station to write down our order – shouted our selections from our tableside over to the back room. Not thanking us for our orders, she turned away before we finished telling her what else we wanted to get.
Miffed, but not wishing to be so easily discouraged, Ta-Chien and I decided to let our partial orders stand as-is to see what would happen.
Meanwhile, Mr. Lee emerged, peremptorily ignored us, and proceeded to speak with some other customers a few booths away – not once turning around to see if we had placed our orders. While Ta-Chien and I waited for and finally got our meal his conversation with those customers engaged his attention the entire time. Meanwhile, Younger Sister never once emerged to ask whether we needed refills on drinks or to see whether everything was okay.
FOOD: SUGAR-LOADED, SHORT ON RICE
Ta-Chien ordered some Ma-po Tofu, which apparently he had to order with some rice. This comes as a shocking (albeit bad) surprise, since most Chinese food comes with anyway. What rice did arrive with his dish was a really small amount, and he had to ask for two refills afterwards for his meal alone. I sampled Ta-Chien’s dish. It was utterly ma-ma hu-hu – just so-so, quite unspectacular.
Since Ta-Chien had ordered a more traditional dish, I ordered the more standard American fare in the form of Kung Pao Chicken. My assessment following mastication: way too sweet. Sweeter even than the breaded kung pao you would get in one of those horrifying “Donuts & Chinese Food” joints you see popping up around L.A. and Phoenix. You know – those places where they fry the donuts in the same murky grease in which they fry the so-called Chinese food?
Well, for lack of better words – the food stank.
When I ordered some more rice (mine was likewise on the sparse side), Younger Sister delivered it to our able with a flippant toss and spun around on her heels to go chew out some of the Mexican help cringing behind the kitchen doorway.
BUBBLE TEA – DARKISH FLUID & LUMPS WITH LOADS OF ICE
So, this place calls itself a tea house. We decided to test the mettle.
After Younger Sister threw down a bowl of rice at us, Ta-Chien and I ordered two standard bubble teas. As we anxiously awaited our tea, we recollected some happy times as youngsters sitting around tables with friends – all of us sucking down some yummy bubble tea.
When the goods arrived, we got some narrow short glasses loaded up with shaved ice, some darkish fluid that attempted to pass itself off as some kind of… something… and lumps of tapioca that hadn’t been sufficiently boiled to lend that appropriately squishy texture for which bubble tea “pearls” have been so noted.
In about five gulps my drink was gone and I was left staring at a column of ice left in the glass. At this point, one word passed trough my mind:
Cheapskates.
UNANIMOUS THUMBS DOWN
I have seen a few cases where the shortcomings of mediocre food have been greatly outweighed by honest attempts at courtesy from hosts willing to take suggestions and make improvements. Not so at Taiwan Tea House. The folks there are decidedly checked out on such remedial learning – the likes of which could have included: greeting us when we came in, actually giving us a menu without us having to ask, asking if we were ready order, asking if the food was okay, asking if we needed more rice, saying thanks after we paid the bill, and saying good-bye when we left.
Having seen Mr. Lee’s formerly very courteous and frequent conversations (from our times at Forbidden City) turn to absolute denial of our existence (we wonder why?), it was disappointing to see he him walk right by without a nod or his former “Glad to see you again!” Perhaps he is a big boss now, nouveau restaurateur, and he has graduated to a better choice in customers with whom to acknowledge and converse. Who knows?
Younger Sister could have taken a few lessons, too. Anyway…
In the absence of neither good food nor good service, my brother Ta-Chien and I give this dump all thumbs down – with both hands!
We did enjoy the Taiwanese television shows pumped over satellite on the big-screen TV though.
HOW T GET TO THIS… PLACE
If you decide to brave the waters, here’s the poop on this dump:
Taiwan Tea House
4040 East 82nd Street, Suite C-3
Indianapolis, IN 46250
(317) 598-9733
(Try to) Have fun!
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