Chula Vista residents and leaders celebrated the opening of the city’s newest local boba tea shop, DABOBA, with an official ribbon cutting ceremony on Oct. 23. Established in 2018, DABOBA offers a variety of organic tea, coffee, yogurt, and smoothie products.
DABOBA owner Kien Li said its fresh teas are brewed for more than an hour, offering black tea, green tea, Japanese Oolong Tea, and its 4 Season teas.
“We also serve them with our boba pearls, which everyone loves and enjoys,” he said. “It gives a very nice texture to the drinks. We brew that over two hours to get a nice consistency, not too soft, not too hard, and not too chewy. We have milk teas as well. It is a refreshing drink, especially in the summertime, when it is very hot, and you are dehydrated.”
Li said the ribbon cutting went very well.
“The mayor was here. The whole community of Chula Vista came out to support us, both on our soft opening and our grand opening day. That was beautiful to see. Hopefully, we can make an impact here in Chula Vista in serving people,” he said.
Li said if you compare DABOBA with other boba shops, their drinks are extremely sweet, where DABOBA’s recipe is a nice ratio of sweetness and freshness of the tea.
“They both go hand in hand with the sweet and the bitter,” he said.
“We offer our Roasted Brown Sugar Milk Tea which is one of our top sellers. On soft opening day alone, we sold about 600 cups of those. We brew pearls, which is the boba. We put it in the cup, the pour fresh milk tea in there, and then top it with a cheese foam. Then we torch it with a flame, kind of like a creme brulee. So, when you put the straw into the cup, you are going to get the cheese foam from the top, and as you work your way down, you will get that fresh tea flavor, along with the brown sugar.”
Li, from Chula Vista, said he is extremely happy to open DABOBA in his own neighborhood.
“Everyone in the community knows that we are locals here. We grew up here in Chula Vista, went to high school near the location. We know the people well. We know the streets well. We were born and raised here in Chula Vista, so it was nice to open near home,” he said.
DABOBA is at 1478 Melrose Place.
