Milk Tea Lab — Restaurant in South San Francisco

Overview: My S.O. and I go almost every week. I can earnestly say that this is our favorite boba tea shop in the bay area. We have been to Tea Time, T4, and TeaSpoon, so we have a decent idea of what is good or not. MilkTeaLab keeps us coming back with their friendly customer service and the customizability of every drink on the menu.

Teas: Their jasmine green tea base is a little over steeped to give it a more bitter taste and I believe that it helps when they add the flavoring or sugar to the tea to counterbalance the sweetness. The milk teas use what I believe to be an oolong base and it goes well with most toppings.

Toppings: The popping bobas come in strawberry and mango, they are fun toppings which pair well with most flavors. Their boba options are mango boba, cool balls, and honey boba. For texture and taste, I will always go for the honey boba. The cool balls and mango boba are similar in texture but I would prefer the mango boba if I had to choose between the two. They have red, blue, and rainbow heart jellies. The red hearts have a raspberry/strawberry like flavor while the blue hearts have a heavy blue rasberry flavor. The rainbow hearts are a plain sugar jelly with no special flavor additive from what I could tell. The lychee and coffee jellies have similar texture. The lychee tastes like an enhanced version of the fruit (yay sugar!), while the coffee jelly is a mild coffee taste and goes really well with their roasted milk teas. The grass jelly is one of the most odd jellies that I have had. It fills the bottom of the cup and looks like a patch of seaweed. It tastes like what you would expect grass jelly to taste like, sugary with a tinge of grassy flavor. Unless you lift your straw, you will be drinking the grass jelly for the first 4th of the drink as it is all connected together and flows through the straw easily and then you will get to enjoy the tea when most of it is gone. Last but not least, the egg pudding, I would only ever imagine drinking this in a warm tea beverage, but it went well in their roasted honey tea. The egg pudding has a consistency one would expect from a pudding used in drinks which is a softer version of a cheese curd and without the squeaky feeling. It has a subtle creamy flavor that accentuates the flavor of the roasted tea really well but leaves a bit to be desired.

Flavors: (the ones that I have tried) They have Lychee(sweet, semi-exotic, and fun). Kumquat(tart in a weird way, not my favorite, but a solid flavor to try). Wintermelon(tastes like a gentle breeze on a brisk fall morning while watching the sunrise) Strawberry(tastes like strawberry flavoring). Mango(subtle mango flavoring). Peach(peaches). Raspberry(more sweet than tart but still good). Honeydew(tastes like honeydew). Lemon(awesome for lemon lovers). Honey lemon(also awesome for lemon lovers). Green apple(tastes like the inside of a caramel apple pop). And pineapple(tart and refreshing! My hands down favorite flavor because I love pineapple flavoring in almost any form, haha!).

Drinks: Their specialty mixed drinks are a lot of fun, but I wouldn't call them refreshing like the green teas. They are mostly sweet and have fun flavor mixes. The milk teas are enjoyable and they each have a robustness to them. I don't like my drinks too sweet, so I usually ask for half sweet to less sweet for milk teas. The green teas will forever be my favorites, I love jasmine tea and any of the flavors taste great at the 'less sweet(30% sugar)' level of sugar. If you get more than the less sweet amount of sugar, you won't be able to taste the jasmine tea as much, so I don't personally suggest it.

I hope that this review helps anyone interested in MilkTeaLab, I will leave you with my forever order and wish you all the best in your boba tea experiences!

My favorite drink to get is a large pineapple green tea with 0% sugar, light ice, and honey...

I wish I could give an even higher rating! I 100% recommend going here and only here for your boba! Not only are the drinks super delicious but also high quality, amazing choices and great prices! We refuse to go anywhere else for our boba and come at least once a week! 💜 My kids and family love this location because the owner and the employees are so sweet and friendly! They are the BEST!!

Remember to tip them, everyone works hard to make your drinks and it's well deserved! 🥹💖

PS, the drinks here are Thai tea with regular boba (tapioca pearls), mango slushies with mango popping boba and the big with mango stars and leachie jelly and a Green tea with lychee jelly and Crystal boba (aka cool boba) and I'm not sure what else but its my new favorite! Strawberry raspberry is okay .. Honeydew is good but get it 50% sweet only 😅 I'll add more pictures!

I also love their turo milk tea, Thai tea, honey roasted tea and matcha green tea milk with tiny boba! Matcha with the tiny boba is my...

I have a part time job delivering food for DoorDash and I have always gone to pick up orders at this place before, and the people who have helped me with the orders have treated me with professionalism and respect, but today I felt really bad. I went to pick up an order and as soon as I entered I approached to ask if the order was ready and a tall white man was there and immediately he didn't even let me speak and he told me to get out of the way and with his hands he made me get out, in a very rude way, I have never felt so disrespectful and so offended as this person made me feel and the woman who was next to him told him that my order was ready and he took it out and gave it to me in a rude way, I don't know what's wrong with this kind of people working there, I don't know if he's the owner, and if he was, he has no right to treat people that way, I left there wanting to cry and with a pain in my stomach, Because I came in with a very good attitude and doing...