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Milk tea with pandan boba and ice cubes
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5 from 2 votes

Pandan Milk Tea (Homemade Jelly Boba Drink)

This pandan milk tea recipe makes super yummy pandan infused milk tea with homemade pandan jelly boba. It's all quick and easy!
Prep Time15 minutes
Cook Time15 minutes
Chilling time (for the jelly)40 minutes
Total Time1 hour 10 minutes
Course: Drinks
Cuisine: Asian
Servings: 4 glasses
Calories: 257.2kcal
Author: Priya Maha

Ingredients

Milk Tea

  • 550 ml water
  • 500 ml milk (cold)
  • 120 ml pandan syrup
  • 4 black tea bags

Pandan Jelly

  • 5 g konnyaku jelly powder
  • 500 ml water
  • 100 g sugar
  • 2 pandan leaves (30 cm each)

Pandan Syrup

    Instructions

    Making the Pandan Jelly

    • Wash and pat the pandan leaves dry. Cut them into 1 inch strips.
    • Place the cut pandan leaves into a food processor. Add 100ml water and process them until fine.
    • Strain the processed leaves to extract the juice. Use a cheesecloth or a fine mesh strainer to ensure all the pulp is strained out. Squeeze the pulp to remove all the juice and discard the pulp.
    • Measure the pandan juice in a jug. Top it with water until it reaches 500ml.
    • Pour the pandan juice into a medium sized pot. Turn on the heat to medium low.
    • In a separate small bowl, measure the sugar. Add the jelly powder to it and mix well. Mixing well will avoid the powder from clumping when added into the pandan water.
    • Add the sugar-jelly powder mix into the pandan water. Stir to mix.
    • Let the jelly cook until the sugar and the jelly powder is completely dissolved. This should take approximately 7 to 8 minutes.
    • Once cooked, pour the jelly into an 8 inches square mold. Let is set completely at room temperature or in the fridge. It will set quicker as it cools down.
    • Once completely firm, remove it onto a cutting board. To release the jelly from the mold, run a thin spatula along the sides of the tin. Place the cutting board over the mold and holding both intact, turn the mold over. Tap it lightly to release the jelly.
    • Cut the jelly into small cubes (approximately 75mm in size). Chill under ready to assemble the milk tea.

    Making the milk tea

    • Add water into a pot and boil it.
    • Once boiled, turn off the heat. Add 4 tea bags and let the tea steep in the hot water for 3 minutes with the lid on.
    • Remove the tea bags (press out all the tea with a spoon) and discard them.
    • Pour milk into the tea. Mix well and chill under ready to be assembled.

    Assembling the pandan milk tea

    • Divide the pandan jelly boba cubes into 4 drinking glasses.
    • Add 2 tablespoons of pandan syrup into each glass.
    • Pour in the milk tea.
    • Finally, add the ice cubes and serve.

    Notes

    • Tea bags can be substituted with loose tea leaves. Use one teaspoon of loose tea leaves for every tea bag. I used regular black tea for this recipe. You can replace it with other types of tea like oolong tea or Earl Grey tea.
    • If you do not wish to make the pandan syrup, simply replace it with simple syrup or gula melaka syrup (palm sugar syrup) in the exact same quantity or use normal white sugar or brown sugar. For 120ml syrup, replace with 4 tablespoons of sugar. Do note that replacing the pandan syrup with simple syrup or sugar means your tea will be missing the pandan flavor. To compensate, simple knot one pandan leave and add it to the water when boiling it to steep the tea. Discard along the with tea bags afterwards.
    • If you cannot find fresh pandan leaves, you can also use the frozen ones. And if those are also not available, you can use store bought pandan extract or pandan paste. These are often very concentrated and you will need very small quantities (⅛th of a teaspoon to make the jelly). Do note that these are often green in color and will impact the color of your tea.
    • Konnyaku jelly powder can be replaced with regular agar agar powder in the exact same quantity. Do note that konnyaku has a chewier texture compared to normal jelly (agar agar) but the latter will still work fine for this pandan milk tea recipe.
    • Whole milk can be replaced with skimmed milk. Other options include oat milk and almond milk.
    • When cutting the jelly, make sure they are small enough to go through the bubbles straws or you will have trouble sucking them through your straw.
    • Another way to serve the jelly in the tea is buy cutting them into strips like in this pandan milk recipe and like how I have cut the grass jelly in this grass jelly milk tea recipe.
    • Make the pandan tea in advance and keep it chilled in the refrigerator. That way, you need not add too many ice cubes when serving as ice cubes will dilute the tea.
    • Given that this is an iced drink, it is best that the milk tea is made slightly more concentrated so that it does not get too diluted when added ice cubes.

    Nutrition

    Calories: 257.2kcal | Carbohydrates: 52.1g | Protein: 4g | Fat: 4.1g | Saturated Fat: 2.3g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.2g | Monounsaturated Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 12.5mg | Sodium: 76.5mg | Potassium: 188.3mg | Fiber: 0.1g | Sugar: 45.3g | Vitamin A: 202.5IU | Calcium: 159mg | Iron: 0.3mg