The Lego Mirror - BobaQuest

Boba Quest: The Alley

2026-08-26T00:25:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop ~~each week~~ whenever I have time.

After nearly seven years of conducting boba reviews, I have built up a decent ability to predict if the boba will be good or not. I will always get a drink so I'm not merely judging a book by its cover, but it's rare that I'm surprised.

The Alley in Montreal genuinely surprised me with its excellent boba tea. From the very first sip, I could tell this wasn't merely good boba, it was fantastic.

(Admittedly, I mostly picked this place because the anonymous Montrealer had declared it the king of Montreal boba...so it's really on me for being shocked at how good it was.)

Just two blocks over from my previous review, The Alley is right next to the Green Line's Guy–Concordia station. There used to be a New York City location that opened in 2019, but best I can tell, it's since closed down.

First boba shop I've been to with an indoor tree.

I ordered the Passionnément Deerioca (the menu was in French!), which is what they call their brown sugar milk tea with boba. I was not asked about my preferred sugar or ice levels.

Boba: 4/4 just perfection. Nicely sweet and exactly the correct chewiness. My first thought was that I had clearly forgotten how good boba could be and should probably downgrade some other places' scores.
Tea: 4/4 excellent; it melded smoothly with the boba without overpowering it.
Bonus: 1/1 the atmosphere in the store was really nice (there's even a tree inside!), I would've stuck around for longer if I had the time. I appreciated the deer iconography, I was initially quite impressed at how Canadian it all seemed (spoiler: it is not).

Total: 9/10. For those keeping track, The Alley is the fourth boba shop to earn a complete score. Whenever I'm next in Montreal, I'll make sure to visit again to see if it can earn the coveted tenth point for consistency.

About those deer...

The Alley is a Taiwanese chain, and the deer are also Taiwanese and endangered. TIL that Taiwan has deer; my sources tell me that they're even on the currency in Taiwan.

I'm slightly disappointed that the deer theme wasn't a Canadian thing, but I can't complain with boba this good. 🇨🇦

Boba Quest: Machi Machi

2026-08-16T14:00:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop ~~each week~~ whenever I have time.

Earlier this year, an anonymous Montrealer declared Machi Machi to be "an elite Boba shop for YUL".

I too am interested in having good boba, so I hopped on the plane to Montreal with my girlfriend, Kajol, so we could get Machi Machi. We met up with my friend Arlo to try out what the anonymous Montrealer tried: black milk tea with crème brûlée.

Machi Machi sits squarely between the Green Line's Guy–Concordia station and the Orange Line's Lucien-L'Allier station. For those not willing to make the trek up north just for some boba, there's also a location in Manhattan's Koreatown.

"Hello cutea. It's not just about a drink, but it's a way of life."
Truer words have never been written on a boba cup.

We ordered the black milk tea with crème brûlée, with boba, regular sugar (the ice quantity was fixed).

Arlo's review:

Boba: 4/4 he said it earned "top marks", and enjoyed the chewiness.
Tea: 3/4 he enjoyed it, but that "the flavours [sic] didn't push much beyond the milk".
Bonus: 0/1 it was nice, but nothing exceptional.

Total: 7/10 ultimately, Arlo said, "I would get it again."

Kajol's review:

Boba: 4/4 she said it had good chewiness, with good QQ.
Tea: 4/4 she liked it a lot, because you get bits of the crème brûlée as you drink.
Bonus: 0/1 she had wanted to give them half a point because of the cute cup and logo, but Boba Quest doesn't allow half points so she declined to give them a full bonus point.

Total: 8/10.

My review:

Boba: 3/4 the boba was slightly too chewy.
Tea: 4/4 because the crème brûlée is initially on the top and only later mixes in with the boba (despite my best attempts to mix it head of time), it really feels like you're getting two drinks in one.
Bonus: 0/1 agreed that it was nice but not exceptional.

Total: 7/10.

Just from walking around, the boba scene in Montreal looks far richer than I remember it being. Hopefully we'll have the opportunity to try a few more places before our boba vacation ends.

Boba Quest: Arteassan

2026-02-22T23:15:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop ~~each week~~ whenever I have time.

I was recently walking down the street earlier this week and noticed that the location that used to be home to Möge Tea (reviewed in Jan. 2025, 6/10) had a new sign up: Arteassan.

As you may have read on the news, there is currently a blizzard hitting New York City, so I did the reasonable thing to do and ~~hunkered down under a warm blanket~~ went outside to try a new boba shop!

(In normal weather you can take the 7, N, W via Queensboro Plaza or E, F, R via Queens Plaza to get there but I'd wait until the weather improves!)

I ordered a Cloud Ceylon Brown Sugar fresh milk tea with regular (100%) sugar and light ice (it's cold out!). The barista said that "Cloud Ceylon" was similar to black tea (TIL that Ceylon is an old name for Sri Lanka), so I expected it to be similar to a standard brown sugar boba milk tea.

Boba: 3/4 the boba was well flavored, but just a little too chewy (not enough to be a problem but enough that I noticed).
Tea: 2/4 on the other hand the tea felt weak and not as strong as I would've liked it. I don't think it was the boba overpowering it either.
Bonus: 1/1 I'm going to give this as a pass today; it was clear they were still setting up the new shop and I don't want to penalize them for that. Plus, they were open during a blizzard! What more can you ask for? (Though to be fair, I walked past 3 other boba shops and they were also open.)

Total: 6/10, decent, but not worth getting in a blizzard. I'll probably visit it again in a month or two to get a more realistic impression.

Boba Quest: ChaHalo

2025-12-31T17:00:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 2025 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop ~~each week~~ whenever I have time.

It's been a while since my last boba review, but sometimes you visit a new place that just inspires you to write about it. ChaHalo recently opened in Long Island City, right in between the Queens Plaza station (E, F, R) and Court Square (7, E, F, G, R) so I thought I'd give it a try with my sister, who was in town for the holidays.

My sister wanted a drink without lactose, and since they didn't have an alternative milk, she asked for a jasmine green tea with boba. The barista added the jasmine green tea to the order and then said: "I'm sorry, our computer won't let you order boba with this." Whaaaaaaaaat. And then, "But we could give you some boba in a separate cup?"

What kind of boba shop offers a drink that you can't add boba to? And not even like some practical issue, it's that their computer can't handle it.

I was able to order a jasmine green milk tea with brown sugar boba without running afoul of any software restrictions. (There were no other boba options aside from brown sugar.)

Boba: 3/4 the brown sugar boba was actually pretty good, well flavored, maybe just a little overcooked.
Tea: 1/4 it was...not good. It was a bit bland to the point the taste of the boba totally overpowered it.
Bonus: 0/1 sorry, our experience didn't merit any bonus points.

Total: 4/10 honestly, if they served a brown sugar milk boba (with lactose-free options!!), I think it would be near perfect.

This story has a somewhat happy ending, in that we walked to a different tea shop across the street and my sister was able to get her lactose-free boba. Stay tuned for that review!

Boba Quest: Surreal Creamery

2025-05-07T15:41:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 2025 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop each week.

Surreal Creamery is not your typical boba shop; on first glance it looks like an ice cream shop. But at least from my point of view, it's enough of a boba shop for Boba Quest 2025 🧋 — a significant amount of their menu is boba and they even have a "dollar boba club" membership.

Plus it's starting to feel like summer. What better way to kick off the warm months than by talking about boba ice cream?

I visited the West Village location at at 126 MacDougal St next to Washington Square Park, accessible via the convenient West Fourth Street station, with A, C, E, B, D, F, and M service. A bit farther is the recently renamed Christopher Street–Stonewall station with 1 train service.

Just like normal boba, you can mix and match ice cream with tea and toppings, but I ordered one of Surreal Creamery's "signature floateas": earl grey ice cream with earl grey tea with boba.

The main difficulty with boba in ice cream is that it gets cold (duh). This ends up getting in the way of the texture of the boba, because it tends to stiffen after like 10 minutes or so, which definitely hinders the experience.

With that in mind, here's my rating:

Boba: 2/4 all things considered, I thought the boba was decent. It wasn't really sweetened, which was probably the right call given how sweet the ice cream was. And it did stiffen as I was finishing it up, but that's unavoidable.
Tea & ice cream: 4/4 if I scored the two separately, I doubt either would get full marks. But together they're fantastic; the ice cream melted nicely into the tea to give more of a milkshake vibe.
Bonus: 1/1 it's ice cream and boba, that's already plenty special.

Total: 7/10 A solid option for a hot summer day. Also, it's not super obvious in the picture, but these are huge and probably best shared with someone else.

P.S. they have a "monster cookie" ice cream flavor, which is just vanilla, except for the fact that it's very blue:

Boba Quest: I'Milky, Easter edition

2025-04-30T23:59:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 2025 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop each week.

In my first-ever Boba Quest review, I looked at I'Milky, my current go-to place in Long Island City (it got a 7/10). I concluded the review by stating:

Assuming they do a similar Easter promotion as last year, I'll review them again in April.

Unfortunately, they did not do the same Easter promotion this year :( Here's the Easter eggs we got last year (and some burritos):

There were three different special drinks, each with their own egg color. Also it's important to note that these were not just normal Easter eggs, they were magic eggs!

Picture courtesy of my sister.

There was artificial scarcity too; only 20 eggs would be sold per day, so you had to show up early if you wanted to get a specific color. The eggs were a relatively hard plastic and make for nice containers in general. From what I remember, the tea was pretty good too, especially the mango panna cotta.

I don't know why I'Milky didn't do the magic Easter eggs again this year, but they have a different promotion going on right now: a coconut water series. They have three special drinks: a yuzu lychee splash, coco matcha dream, and coconut espresso rush.

I love lychees, so I had to go for the yuzu lychee splash, with boba. I asked for 100% sugar, but he said it would be way too sweet and suggested I just do 30% — so I did. Note that they only offer the specialty drinks in medium and not large.

Two of my favorite things: trains and boba.

Boba: 2/4 the boba and lychee bits were great, but the rest of the topping wasn't. The drink also contained yuzu rinds, which kind of ruined the whole experience because they were such a different texture. I kind of appreciated the flavor, but it was just hard to eat and didn't go well in the boba straw.
Tea: 4/4 for a coconut milk promotion, I could taste absolutely zero coconut flavor. It tasted like 90% yuzu flavor, and 10% lychee, and honestly, I much prefer that.
Bonus: 0/1 I'm still a bit disappointed they didn't have the magic eggs this year, that would've been bonus worthy.

Total: 6/10. It was promising, but really fell apart because of the yuzu rinds just messing up the texture and feel of the drink. I don't know if they'll be able to accomodate, but next time I'll ask for the same drink, just without the rinds.

And in case you're interested, I'm told that this promotion will last until mid-May.

Boba Quest: Shiny Tea

2025-04-23T23:59:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 2025 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop each week.

As I wrote about last week, one of my favorite boba shops, Shiny Tea, is closing soon (now extended to May 17th). Knowing that time was running out to fill up my privacy-preserving stamp card, I brought two friends with me to review it: Emmie and Wen.

We headed over to the Upper West Side; it's located at 2667 Broadway Ave. Getting there via the subway is easy, you can either take the 1 train to 103rd Street or if you don't mind walking a few minutes, the 96th Street station has 2 and 3 service as well.

Left to right: mango green tea, taro milk tea, classic milk tea, jasmine green milk tea.

I ordered my usual jasmine green milk tea with boba, 100% sugar and less ice:

Boba: 3/4 the boba was solid, with good flavor and texture. (I previously would have called it perfect, but I've had better)
Tea: 4/4 exactly what I want out of a jasmine green milk tea. Nothing more to say on that.
Bonus: 1/1 Shiny Tea doesn't really have any ambiance, you can barely stand inside of it. But it makes up for it in great customer service and its privacy-preserving stamp card.

Total: 8/10.

Emmie was truly dedicated to the cause of helping me fill out the stamp card and ordered two drinks. (But also she said she felt like having two drinks.) Both were worth consuming in her words — she didn't throw them out unfinished or regret it — but found them a bit disappointing.

The first one she had was a taro milk tea, regular sweetness, no ice, with boba:

Boba: 3/4 the boba was fine, enjoyable, tasty, but not spectacular.
Tea: 2/4 maybe I'm too picky when it comes to taro, but I didn't enjoy it that much. I think there was too much milk and something about the taro wasn't to my liking.

The second drink was a mango green tea with lychee jelly:

Jelly: 3/4 standard enjoyable jelly in tea. Nothing special.
Tea: 1/4 - what I really wanted when ordering this was something more akin to fruit juice, but I didn't see mango drinks on the menu that were closer to what I was thinking of. I wasn't a big fan of the tea flavor, but I think it's primarily a personal preference.

Emmie did not award a bonus point, agreeing with Wen (keep reading) that it was small and cramped. Fair enough.

Totals: 5/10 and 4/10.

Wen ordered a classic milk tea with 30% sweetness and less ice. Notably he did not get boba nor any other topping, despite this being a boba review series. SMH

Boba: n/a
Tea: 3/4 I wasn't blown away by the tea flavor but it was decent, and it was also a good level of sweetness.
Bonus: 0/1 the shop was tiny, so we had to wait on the sidewalk for our drinks. It also got cramped quickly with multiple customers.

Congrats to Wen for managing to break my meticulously devised rating system, but I think we can add it up to 3 out of 5, or a total of 6/10.

It is a bit disappointing when my friends didn't enjoy one of my favorite places as much as I did, but that's one of the fun things about boba, everyone likes it in their own particular way. And yes, even if you don't like the actual tapioca balls, we can still be friends.

Shiny Tea is closing

2025-04-16T11:25:00+00:00

I have sad news to share: Shiny Tea on the Upper West Side (UWS) is closing ~~at the end of this month~~ on May 17th. When I used to live on the UWS, it was my go-to boba shop, and I was one of their regulars. Within about 2-3 months of me moving into the area, the person who took my order started simply asking me, "You want your usual?"

I had a Friday evening routine of walking through Riverside Park, passing General Grant's Tomb, picking up Chinese food near Columbia and then finally grabbing my jasmine green milk tea with boba from Shiny Tea on my way home.

This is not a review, I'll do that next week. I just wanted to spread the word so people can visit it themselves before it closes. It's located on Broadway, between 101st and 102nd streets, near the 1 train's 103rd Street stop. If you don't mind walking a few minutes, the 96th Street station has 2 and 3 service as well.

Be careful, Shiny Tea is really easy to miss, it's basically the width of a closet:

It's the smallest boba shop I've ever seen, there's not even enough room for multiple people to wait in line to order drinks!

I rarely go there now that I live in Queens, but last week I had an appointment on the UWS, so I stopped by. Even though I moved out of the neighborhood basically a year ago, he still recognized me and commented that it had been a while since he'd seen me.

After a bit of catchup, he broke the bad news: the owner of Shiny Tea was not interested in renewing the lease, so it would be closing. It was a gut punch for me, so despite getting my regular order, I didn't really feel like doing a formal review.

I highly recommend stopping by in the next week if you're in the area, it will be worth it!

Boba Quest: Erye Tea Shop

2025-04-10T22:40:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 2025 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop each week.

Unfortunately I've been sick for the past two weeks and haven't been able to go around to try new boba places, which honestly made being sick even worse. But I'm better now, and ready to catch up on all the boba I missed!

Last week I tried Erye Tea Shop in Long Island City, Queens, located near the Court Square–23rd Street station, which provides 7, E, M and G service. In Chinese, 二葉 (pronounced er-ye), means "two leaves", which is also what their logo looks like.

In the beginning of March, regular readers will remember that I visited a boba shop located inside a laundromat. In a similar vein, Erye shares its location with a hair salon:

It's not really the most pleasant place to sit and sip tea since hair salons are relatively loud places with blow dryers and other things. I ended up walking down to the nearby Gantry Plaza State Park and had my boba at the waterfront.

Speaking of which, let's get to the boba! I ordered a roasted oolong milk tea with boba, 70% sugar and light ice.

Boba: 4/4 it's been a while since I've had honey boba that tasted this good. It struck a nice balance between being able to taste the honey flavor, but it didn't overpower the tea.
Tea: 2/4 I didn't really enjoy the tea; I think some of the blame is on me for ordering oolong, which I'm not as big of a fan of, so I'm giving them a 2 instead of a 1.
Bonus: 0/1 mixing a boba shop and a hair salon is really not super appealing

Total: 6/10. I don't see myself coming back here unfortunately, Long Island City is pretty boba-rich and has other places that I rated more highly.

Boba Quest: Xing Fu Tang

2025-03-19T18:00:00+00:00

As part of Boba Quest 2025 🧋, I'm trying and reviewing a new boba shop each week.

Flushing is one of my favorite neighborhoods in Queens because of how diverse and lively it is. Originally founded by the Dutch in the 1600s, today it's an incredible melting pot, primarily populated by Asian immigrants.

My coworker David Huerta originally recommended Xing Fu Tang to me at least two years ago. I went last year, loved it, and knew I had to review it for Boba Quest.

It's right down the street from the end of the 7 train and right next to the Flushing–Main Street LIRR station.

Mmmm, fresh boba.

Even before you walk in, you get the sense you're in for a treat. They keep a giant pot of fresh boba on display and you can see employees scooping it up into cups.

Their speciality is brown sugar boba milk (not tea). So that's exactly what my girlfriend, Kajol, and I got — with light ice and regular sugar.

Probably the third different "No. 1" chain from Taiwan that I've tried.

My review:

Boba: 4/4 the boba looked fresh and it tasted fresh too. It was as close to perfect as I think you can get.
Tea: 4/4 it was everything I wanted out of a brown sugar boba milk. Excellent sweetness and they make it special by caramelizing a little bit of the brown sugar so you even have a bit of crunch texture.
Bonus: 1/1 it's a pretty small store, there's barely enough room for the line. But that ends up making the atmosphere even nicer, because you can tell everyone else is really there for the boba. Also if it's a nice day, you can sit across the street on the steps of the library.

Total: 9/10. Congrats to Xing Fu Tang for earning the second complete score (after Débutea last month). I'm already looking forward to coming back and seeing if they can replicate the same experience to earn the tenth and final point.

Kajol's review:

Boba: 3/4 - It had a good flavor; it started out with a "melt in your mouth consistency" and then eventually got slightly chewier. I liked it better once it was chewier.
Tea: 2/4 - it was just milk so there was no tea flavor, but I would've liked the tea flavor! The caramelized bit on the top was wonderful, as it added some great texture.
Bonus: 1/1 - the ambiance was nice, the menu was clear, and there was a small area in the back where people can pick up a stick and then pick out a fortune based on the number on the stick.

Total: 6/10. Kajol said she would definitely want to go back to try the boba milk tea version of the drink.

Interestingly this is the first time Kajol and I have had our reviews diverge by more than a point. Of course, I think I'm right, but we'll have the opportunity to try it again in the near future.

For our next visit I think I'll be obligated to try Xing Fu Tang's more extravagant option: the gold foil boba milk. Yes, they really put gold leaf on top, and certainly charge you for it!

Shoutout to David for originally recommending Xing Fu Tang to me; if anyone else has tips, please let me know.

The Lego Mirror - BobaQuest

Boba Quest: The Alley

Boba Quest: Machi Machi

Boba Quest: Arteassan

Boba Quest: ChaHalo

Boba Quest: Surreal Creamery

Boba Quest: I'Milky, Easter edition

2025 Easter edition#

Boba Quest: Shiny Tea

Shiny Tea is closing

Boba Quest: Erye Tea Shop

Boba Quest: Xing Fu Tang