The Story of The Tea Fresca
Bin Chen
All summer we’ve been serving up iced drinks (our ice machines can barely keep up)! With the hotter months here (not that San Francisco really knows what hot means), iced drinks are in demand and our tea frescas are the perfect solution. Currently, our house made fruit purees flavors are strawberry and mango. Try our refreshing strawberry jasmine tea-fresca: equal parts strawberry puree and iced jasmine tea. Or try our newest (and definitely prettiest) creation, the layered mango matcha tea fresca: rich mango puree, topped with organic premium grade matcha!
For now, let us tell you a little about how we came up with our line of tea frescas:
We’re a company that’s always getting our hands messy and experimenting: sourcing new teas and ingredients, testing new drink concepts and mixing new flavors. Our experiments often become our biggest menu hits like the horchata boba: the highest quality of sweet rice milk, cinnamon, vanilla, sugar and a splash of rich organic whole milk. All of which gives a nod to the numerous taquerias in the Mission and with a heaping scoop of boba, it still sticks to our Asian roots. You can order it “dirty,” with a shot of espresso or cold brew and it gives a nod to the artisanal coffee world of San Francisco too. We wanted to do the same thing with our next experimental claim to fame that we’ve recently been rolling out: tea frescas.
Tea-frescas are our own new Mission meets boba shop fusion. One part Mexican agua fresca or ‘fresh water’, those sweet, fruity and floral blends that taquerias sell in heaping batches. The other part, the oh so familiar syrup based fruit tea that many boba shops are known for. Both being refreshing and delicious in their own ways, we wondered what a drink would look like if we concocted a tea version of the two.
The idea was to create a next level quality product, sans powder or fruit syrups and instead use fresh, seasonally sourced, housemade fruit purees. Then, mix the puree with our classic tea blends you already know and love over ice. Thus creating our hybrid, the tea-fresca: a fresh fruit tea.
With the Indian summer here, what kind of new fruity flavors would you like to cool off with?