Taste Tea

Menu can be a bit confusing with lots of selections and variety to chose from. I wanted hot tea but none available, hence the name. lol prices were good. Parking can be a challenge during peak hours.

This was my first time at taste tea, however I’ve had bubble drinks many times before.
I’m severely allergic to diary (not lactose intolerant). I saw on the menu, it said «Milk tea with dairy free creamer» I got excited to see this. I asked the worker if I could read the ingredients on the «dairy free creamer» because of my allergies. She showed it to me, and in big bold letters it said «contains: milk derivatives» I asked her why the menu said it was a diary free creamer if it has milk in it. Her response was, «It doesn’t have milk, it has a milk derivative. So if you’re lactose intolerant you can still have it.» I was shocked. I didn’t wanna argue with her because obviously she was uneducated. I just told her I can’t have that because it has milk and I am allergic. And went on to ordering something else.
I’m very glad I checked the ingredients, because if I listened to the menu (which I should be able to) or the lady, I would have ended up in the hospital that night.
Overall the workers were very rude, and the boba was soggy. I’d rather stick to shaka shaka!

I’ve had taste tea plenty of times when they first opened and had only a select number of drinks so I was impressed by the wide selection they offer now! From blended drinks to iced and milk teas it seems like there’s an option for everyone. Even the flavors have expanded beyond the original milk tea to include ice cream flavor and what not, and don’t forget about all the add in jellys, custards, and bobas too.
I think this was the first milk tea establishment to really let the customer choose the sweetness level, which I love! The price is very reasonable for the size of the drink. Boba is included for free and the other jellys and custards are an add in.
This past visit I ordered the matcha latte and was really surprised by the lack of flavor. It tasted like their original milk tea. The drink didn’t even have a hint of green color to it. I like my matcha treats with a lot of it so maybe that’s why I had expectations for that pow of matcha! Perhaps my drink maker was a little light on the flavoring because it seems like other pics of people who ordered the drink were green tea colored. I got it with the small boba balls, which are the perfect bite size but get mushier quicker than the larger ones. Also for me, I think there’s too many boba balls in proportion to the drinks. But all in all I do like their milk tea. I’ll just try another drink next time.

This place is delicious! If your looking for something refreshing try their teas. I went twice when i spent my 1 week in Hawaii and my experiences were great each time.

I stumbled upon this place and boy am I glad I did! The first time here I was a little confused but I asked for help and the kind female at the register explained to me how to order etc etc. What’s nice is that they offer you to tastes it for sweetness prior to putting fulfilling the order which I like and really appreciate!

Popular boba place, especially with students!
I like the system here. They take your order, ask you for the level of sweetness you would like for your drink, allow you to sample the drink so they can adjust it accordingly, & then give you your drink.
Taiwan Winter Melon Tea Latte: Good but it tasted watered down.
Ice Cream Milk Tea: Tea with ice cream on the top, I really enjoyed this one!

Limited parking. We had to park near the stinky garbage bin. Inside is pretty big though. Majority of the space is for the seating area. It’s pretty warm in there with small fans that don’t really help.
I got the taro milk tea with lychee jelly. Drink was great tho, esp since I’m not a huge fan of taro. I like how the milk teas are non dairy!
I don’t see anything special about this place compared to other boba places.

With so many new milk tea places open now, Taste Tea has taken a back seat. I’ve never really cared for their milk tea in the first place (I’m more of a HK style milk tea girl), but whenever I get a craving for something less heavy, I always come here for either the wintermelon or chrysanthemum-​puer tea (75% sweet). And even though it’s supposedly 15 calories per ball… mini tapioca. Always. Pftt calories.

People have this thing for this place incant seem to find. Guess it’s a trial and error thing but been here like 5 times and still can’t see what all the hype is about. Drinks are inconsistent and not what I think I ordered. Parking has ALWAYS been a problem here yet people are filling this place up. Can someone tell me what drink and at what sweetness is the reason for all the fans here? Grind on! Pau!

Loving the new menu designs! Very well done and professional. Also the taro chunks are a tasty new add on! Friendly staff as always

I was pretty parched so the answer to that is… find a bubble tea shop!!! Their location is not too far from ala moana mall. Parking is extremely tight and limited. However, there is a good turnover rate so no worries! The shop wasn’t too packed, so I was able to peruse the menu, and place my order within minutes.
The options were extensive. I felt the urge to order a couple of drinks, because I can be a glutton at times;) I was about to order an almond joy smoothie, but I ended up with a simple strawberry milk tea. I received my drink in a few minutes, and I eagerly stuck my straw on top.
There was several tables and chairs inside to relax with friends. It’s not a bad place to enjoy the various tasteful beverages.
The strawberry was light and flavorful. I was pleased that I chose the least amount of sugar sweetened. The combination of milk to my strawberry is what made my milk tea enjoyable. I definitely will come back for my almond joy!!!

⁴⁄₅ Stars for the quality of their drinks and their topping choices. ³⁄₅ star for their delivery service.
DELIVERY SERVICE: I made a phone order at 11:30am and they gave me an estimated time of delivery between 12:30pm-1:00pm. Yikes! That’s a WHOLE HOUR of waiting! But I put in an order anyways. Delivery requires minimum order of 8 drinks, and minimum total purchase of $ 30. Debit/​credit cards not accepted. Overall, it took about 45 minutes to get our drinks. Mr. Tea requests for only a minimum drink order of 6 drinks in a 2 mile radius, after 11am, AND they deliver almost instantly! Craving taste tea? Just plan wayyyyy ahead of time.

This is where I’ve tasted my very first milk tea. It was here that I fell in love with milk tea. And, it was here that started my milk tea craze. Taste Tea started off as my go-​to milk tea place, but then all these other milk tea joints started popping up. And before I knew it, I had new favorites and Taste Tea became a thing of the past.
I still come here from time to time, especially if it’s close to where I’ve just eaten dinner. Their milk tea has stayed the same. It’s still pretty good. Service is quick and efficient… most times, and prices are pretty reasonable.

BOBA YUMYUMYUMM
Probably one of the better options for boba, in my opinion. Great texture and now they have so many options! I always go with the winter melon dream tea latte. Regular size is $ 3.50 and large is $ 4. You can add your typical fixins (boba, mini boba, custard pudding, etc.) and they let you do half and half if you want. The boba here is the right texture and just a little sweet to make it really tasty. I also usually get pudding because. well, I love pudding.
You can also customize the sweetness. Regular sweetness (100%), less sweet (70%), half sweet (50%), etc. They let you taste the drink to make sure it’s to your liking so you can make it sweeter or less sweet, as needed.
They also have a stamp card that used to be one stamp per drink but now is one stamp per $ 2 spent. Yay loyalty!
Parking is also much better now than it used to be. They have reserved stalls outside that are off the street so it’s really nice that way because Kapiolani Blvd can get really chaotic.

They have a ton of options of drinks and a good amount of add ons. I got a large blended matcha latte with double big tapioca. It was really delicious. I liked it because a lot of boba places have green tea but not matcha so I thought that was cool.
$ 5 credit card minimum– which is why I got double boba. Originally it was $ 4.75 so the extra boba added 50 cents.
If you like your boba firm, definitely go to this place.
I liked this place. I got exactly what I wanted– a matcha latte with boba and it was reasonably priced so I’m happy.

My wife has been on a milk tea kick lately. We’ve been going all over town trying all the bubble tea cafes based off of Unilocal reviews. So it came down to Taste Tea on an early Sunday morning just when it opened.
When all is said and done, she will not only refuse to go back to this place, she insisted on writing a review too. That’s not very common.
The cashier was unfriendly and rushed despite no other customers.
The milk tea itself was like drinking water. You neither tasted any milk nor any of the tea in the drink. They trade quality for quantity. When I asked her what she thought she said «totally sucks» Brief.

Important note when ordering: almond milk tea is NOT actually almond milk. It was regular milk tea flavored so strongly with artificial almond extract you could smell it from across the room. Not impressed. Luckily I don’t have a dairy intolerance issue. False advertising.

I guess this is the go to spot for boba for kids. It was pretty packed as kids got out of school and stopped here for boba.
First off, I liked how they let you sample your drinks before they give it to you. But all our drinks were powdery and artificial tasting. The boba was still too hard and not fully cooked. My cousin got their honeydew and as she sipped, she got chunks of powder. They didn’t even shake it up enough. When we looked at the bottom, green powder was still sitting there.
Definitely won’t be back. The only benefit is that it’s cheap, but quality over quantity.

Almond milk tea was satisfying although the tapioca could be better. I would say this place has potential to be a great Tea place.
Parking is good for a shop that’s downtow. Lighting could be brighter. Seems dead on a Thursday night.

This is definitely one of my top two favorite bubble tea places in Oahu– and I have tried many places! Where to start? My favorite part about Taste tea is the flavor of the teas. I have tried a couple of the different flavor offerings such as black tea, macha, chocolate, and strawberry– and it’s such a rare thing to love all the flavors that I tried, but I do! I like that the flavors are subtle and complement the black tea flavor well. I have rotated through a couple of favorite flavors, but my current to-​go has to be the strawberry. Even though strawberry powder is mixed into a black tea base, the texture is silky smooth and creamy– here is no graininess here. It also doesn’t have that mysterious neon pink color that other places have.
One of my qualms with other bubble teas is that they are too sweet. Taste tea solves that issue but allowing you to moderate the «sweetness level» of your teas. This is perfect for me because I often dilute my drinks.
Oh and I almost forgot to mention that the tapioca pearls are divine! The pearls have a perfect firm texture. It is so rare to find a place that serves you both great tea and pearls, but Taste tea delivers!

I posted a comment on their IG page but it got deleted. Did not receive a response as to why they deleted it so I’m posting it here.
This places says they do free delivery but only with an 8 tea order minimum. However, their delivery is really bad. My work place has stopped ordering from them because they either get our orders wrong, are 1−2hrs late or they completely miss orders. We’ve asked for a refund one time and they said that we had to come down and get it from their in store location. What’s the point of delivery? Their customer service is non existent so good luck trying to speak to someone who shows any concern for your phone order.
As far as the tea goes, tea tastes ok. I’ve had a lot better. My workplace only orders from here because they are the only tea place with «free delivery.» They use mostly powder and no real fruit. If you want a much better tea place that you uses organic and real fruit/​juice and much better tasting tea and better customer service, I suggest you go to Shaka Shaka tea express!

Cute little spot I found on Unilocal!Off street parking, great place to park my scooter, and not to mention the tea and desserts are delicious! I ordered a taro milk tea with boba. The taro is nutty and slightly sweet, but I could have done without the boba. I just don’t think I’m a huge boba lover. I also got a taro panne cotta which was awesome! I recommend this place if you’re in the neighborhood 3.5 stars for sure.

Yummy, reasonable prices, friendly staff. You can mix up the tapioca size which was fun. $ 5 min to use your credit card so I had to buy a macaroon but it was a great macaroon so no biggie.

Yummmmmy! Teas taste great and boba are cooked to perfection. My favorite is the passion fruit with pineapple chunks. Also love that they have both small and large boba. Worth the drive from Kaneohe just to grab a large taste tea. Wish they opened a location on the windward side

There’s a lot of competition in the bubble tea space, but Taste Tea fares well for:
— Good tea
— Good prices (~$ 2.50 — $ 4.50)
— Good variety of fillings to choose from
— Reasonably fast service
— Interior has been upgraded; better counter, seating areas, and air conditioning.
On the down side…
— It’s popular, so it can be busy
— Parking is a bit interesting… not a lot of it at times it seems!
Overall, it’s a good choice and bigger than some of the other places nearby /​in the Kapiolani area…

It’s pretty good! I got taro chunks and did not like that in my drink so I don’t recommend it. Prices are a little too spendy but it’s worth it once in a while. Toppings are not included, you are charged 50 cents per topping. But if the prices don’t bother you then this is the place for you!
I love how they have a lot of space to be able to hang out there.

I tried this place yesterday on the suggestion of my friend Beth who goes there daily with her husband. I have my own fave place but am always down for trying new boba drinks.
The place is large with a lot of tables and very aggressive air conditioning, I had to pull out my sweater which is rare. There was a real good mix of people there, all ages and walks of life, which I liked.
I chose a table off to the side that was near an outlet so I could plug my dying phone in. They have a decent sized menu but I was bummed to find that while they have coffee jelly, they don’t have coffee milk tea which is what I’d been craving. I settled for the regular milk tea with coffee jelly and regular sweetness. As others have mentioned, they did ask if I wanted a sample of my sweetness level but I declined. I also ordered the garlic butter toast since I needed a snack.
The milk tea tastes ok but the jelly was a lot firmer than I’m used to, almost chewy. And while the bread that the toast was made of was soft and chewy, the garlic butter topping was really really salty. I ended up throwing it away because it was so overpowering.
Overall the place seems decent and id go again if I was with friends or it was right in front of me. But I’ll probably stick with my usual haunts before coming back to this one.

Mmm, taste tea!!! I really like their spring tea with lychee jelly. The best part is the staff ask you how much sugar you like in your drink. Parking can be kinda tough because this place is normally packed with customers. There’s no street parking.

I thought I came here enough to know what the sweetness levels are without having to sample anymore, but they’re pretty inconsistent. Today, I ordered my milk tea half sweet, but it turned out to taste like regular. Overall, I like most of their drinks but they are too inconsistent with their sweetness.

To be honest with you folks… I have no clue about these so called «Bubble Tea» joints that have been opening up all over town…
I think I’m more of a coffee guy, or a pot of tea with dim sum kinda guy… you know what I mean?
Well, how did I end up here if I’m not a big fan of these type of drinks? Well, after having a splendid dinner with my friend Jules Y., we decided to mosey on down to the Ala Moana area to look for some dessert or drink. And that is how I ended up at this joint.
What can I say about this place?
Extremely POPULAR! There were so many young people hanging out (Errrr…including me! Buwahahahaha!)
I saw a lot of people hangin’ in the parking lot, as well as inside of the shop. The shop was brightly lit, with a lot of tables so you could sit down and have a drink, as well as have a wonderful conversation if you can get past the loud noises due to the volume of people who go here.
The menu here was extensive! Since I don’t normally go to places like this, cuz I probably don’t have interest in it, I decided to order something simple… and I ended up with a Hot Jasmine Green Tea.
Jules ordered a Honey Dew Melon type of drink (kinda milky light green colored)…as this place did not offer any Papaya flavored drink (which I think she likes).
The nice thing about this place is that they offered you = «Sweetness Levels» for your tea. I think if I was correct… they had 5 levels.
After ordering your tea, if you are curious about the sweetness level of your tea, the clerk was nice enough to give you a sample so you can test the sweetness of your drink. before pouring it into your tea cup. Which I thought was pretty nice, because who wants to pay for a $ 4 tea, and not enjoy any of it, because it was too sweet. Correct?
And after all of this for sweetness level… guess what level the both of us ordered our tea’s at? We ended up picking the «0» level. Lol!
They also offered two sides of tea servings here… either a Medium or Large cup.
Truthfully, my tea was on the strong side (which I liked)…but I really can’t tell the difference between this cup of tea, or if I was drinking a pot of tea with my dim sum at a Chinese restaurant. Lol!
As for my friend — Jules Y.‘s tea… it was actually kinda pretty good! Lol! She let me sample a little, and if she wasn’t looking, I might have taken some humongous slurps from it, but then I realized I had to be a gentleman about it, and that she could potentially give me a fatal karate chop if I had tanked her drink… Lol! I really had to restrain myself…
Her drink had a slight creaminess to it, very good melon flavor (but not over powering), and very refreshing. Although she ordered her tea at the «0» level of sweetness… I guess the melon has it’s own natural sweetness, so there was a subtle sweetness to it, which was very nice indeed.
This place also offered a few pastries/​cake stuff, as well as a waffle/​pancake kinda dessert. I did not see any of my beloved custard pie… so I did not indulge in any of the sweets. The pastries/​cake stuff was very limited in selection, but some of the items were very pleasing to the eye (if you what I mean).
Would I come back here again? Probably not on my own… but with friends… sure thing!
If I can say one thing about this shop… lots of traffic in this store, and they may want to mop up the floor once in a while, as when we were waiting for our teas… the floor was a little sticky!
On the bright side of this, at least if you walk on the sticky floor, there is a high chance that you will not slip or fall! Buwahahahahaha!

Refreshment perfected in the form of these light and addictive milk tea beverages. You choose desired sweetness level and add-​ons like mini tapioca, tapioca, flavored jellies or pudding. You also have the option of tasting a sample of your drink b4 they serve it to you.
I had the 50% sweet level taro milk tea and it was perfect.
Prices range from $ 2.75 — 3.75 for a medium drink (12 oz) and $ 3.50 — 4.00 for a large (16 oz).
For those not in the mood for milk tea, try the regular tea; varieties include Assam, Chrysanthemum Pu-​Er, and Jasmine. Iced teas available in flavors like Mango, Grapefruit and Lychee.
Nice open, air conditioned seating area and friendly staff.
Other offerings include macarons, desserts (mini meringues & cheesecake, cakes, tiramisu, pannacotta), and signature Boba Waffle.

*FYI*
On the day of your Birthday, stop by For a free drink!
(On day of your bday only)
I saw the little sticker on the door, during my last visit.
& lucky it was close to my bday.
Thank U Taste Tea for the free drinky! It was a nice treat!
Got my free drink: I got the green tea, milk tea, with half coffee jelly & mini boba. wow! I enjoyed this drink! I will add this to my «must order» for next visit.

Don’t be intimidated by the long lines, as they go fairly quickly if you’re with friends!
There are a number of different options here in terms of flavor, milk, and sweetness. This place makes your drink highly customizable, which I think is pretty neat.
I opted for the Strawberry Milk Tea and found it to be pretty taste-​tea (har har). They always let you sample the tea before it’s sealed up, so the sweetness is perfect for your palate.
They have a different variety of fillings (?) like boba, azuki bean, jellies, and ice cream too! Yum.

By my check-​ins and reviews, I’m clearly on a hunt for some good milk tea! Taste Tea just did not impress — maybe I ordered wrong?
I got the oolong milk tea at less sweet (70%) with azuki beans and also tried the strawberry milk tea with custard (saw quite a few people getting this and had to try). Both were just meh in flavor. I DO like the uniqueness of the azuki beans, but not enough to go out of my way to get it.

One of my favorite things to do anywhere or anytime is trying new boba places. I was on vacation so of course I would have to at least see if they had any decent milk tea in the area.
Being the indecisive person that I am, I didn’t know what to get. I asked the cashier what she recommended and she let me know that the items that were marked up on the menu were their most popular items. I decided to go on the safer side and try their milk tea with small tapioca. The cashier noticed how unsure I was with my order and let me sample it before they sealed the drink. If I didn’t like it, they were happy to adjust it to my liking or change it for another drink. Loved that they gave me that option because I’ve had so many experiences where I have been unsatisfied with my drink and could do nothing about it but throw it away.
With that said, the milk tea here was so good. It’s comparable to the milk tea at Quickly which I personally like a lot.
There’s an option to order by phone for pick up which is pretty cool so you can avoid long lines if they do get busy. But every time I was here, I never had to wait.
Also, this place was conveniently located near the hotel I was staying at and since I liked it so much, I went here almost everyday of my trip :)