Today, we are transporting you to the happening streets of Taiwan where the afternoon pick-me-up isn’t a coffee run, but a boba break.

The word “boba” refers to a broad category of chunky drinks — including everything from iced tea with tapioca pearls to fresh juice loaded with fruity bits — or even black tapioca pearls themselves. But most commonly, the drink that Taiwan has gifted to the world consists of black tea, milk, ice, and chewy tapioca pearls — all shaken together like a Friday night cocktail and served with an iconic large straw to slurp up all the marbles of tapioca that cluster at the bottom of the cup.

Rumour has it that the beloved beverage was actually created in a moment of boredom! The history books recall it as follows:

During a rather laborious staff meeting one day, Ms. Lin Hsiu Hui of Chun Shui Tang teahouse, decided to plop her Taiwanese dessert called fen yuan — a sweetened tapioca pudding— into her Assam iced tea and drink it. It was so good that it was immediately added to the menu, and soon became the top-selling product. After that, teahouses all over Taiwan started adding tapioca pearls and different fruit flavours to their iced teas — bubble tea as we now know It was born!

Poured into a clear cup to show off its bouncy and bubbly qualities, bubble tea can be made in a wide range of ways — included how Michelle, T2’s in-house tea sommelier, has prepared it for you, below.