I would just jokingly say: ‘Oh, what if Mommy can make a bubble tea brand? You can just drink it all day every day.'” But I know that I can’t feed them sugar all the time. “Like, you have this chewy little thing, it’s kind of cute. “My kids love bubble tea – who doesn’t?” she posits, understandably. Chen tells me Mother Pearl was born out of her children’s adoration for bubble tea, and her own hatred for protein shakes. We take a walk in the busy street, and march uphill. And if that wasn’t enough bubble brainwashing, there stands Chen, in an all-black outfit with a striking red pearl necklace. Inside, there’s a section with lights that look like – are you ready? – giant tapioca pearls. The exterior is dirty green, and the whole thing looks like a giant jukebox or even a pretty vintage toaster oven. It’s a quaint little store clad with wood all around. I meet Chen at Mother Pearl’s flagship in Hong Kong Central. Need I say more? A focus on health and wellness And then there’s the signature Po Mylk Tea, a condensed coconut milk and Keemun rose tea base complemented by homemade oat-cashew milk, charcoal tapioca, grass jelly, chia seeds and rose petals. The Pot of Gold is an oat-cashew masala chai with a turmeric spice blend, ginger molasses jelly, turmeric, activated charcoal tapioca and coconut froth. There’s the Glimpse of Sunburst, a limited-edition drink with mango, pomelo, passionfruit, coconut nectar and froth, oat-cashew milk, blue spirulina and pink salt syrup, and blue spirulina chia seed jelly. Let me just lay my case forward with some of the picture-perfect, ultra-colourful menu options. It is, as Chen calls it, “weird but magical”. In a city with tons of bubble tea establishments, Mother Pearl stands out.Ĭould it be the fact that it’s fully plant-based? Or that its good-for-you teas contain low-GI sugars and superfood boba pearls? Could it be that everything is made in-house, from scratch? Honestly, it’s probably all of that and more.
This is all thanks to Po Chen, who founded what she calls a “wellness brand” in 2020 and made me question all my food opinions after turning me into a milk tea fanatic in the space of mere days. So wrong, in fact, that the frequency with which I went to Mother Pearl, Hong Kong’s foremost vegan bubble tea brand, in my two-week trip to the city was frankly embarrassing. So of course someone had to come along and prove me wrong. Milk in my bubble tea has always been a no-no. The only way I stomach tea with milk is if it’s chai, and it needs to be hot. Heck, my mom loves bubble tea – so maybe it’s just genetics?Įither way, while I was always a fruity bubble tea drinker, I’ve never been one for the milky pearl tea. I don’t know what it is: the chewy boba (which refers both to the drink category and the black tapioca pearls themselves) that never seems to end, or that moment when a refreshing pearl pops a surprise in your mouth and leaves you wanting more, or just the endless list of flavours to choose from. On the heels of opening its fifth location in the city this Monday, and ahead of launching the sixth store this weekend, its founder Po Chen bursts the bubble on the health aspects of her teas, why almost everything is made in-house, and her ultimate goal for the brand.
9 Mins Read Mother Pearl, which opened in 2020 as Hong Kong’s first vegan bubble tea shop, is an outlier in the space.
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