Bubblehead

Sad to see this place closing. Seemed like a decent neighborhood hangout and interesting concept. Drinks were pretty good (although a little pricey), and I would’ve recommended the spot as it was chill. Guess not enough community came by though. Still, quirky places similar to this are important. Hope to find some other chill spots here in SA that aren’t gentrified, and have an interesting spin.

My boyfriend and I came here like a week and a half ago. I ordered Thai iced tea slush and it was hands down the worst boba tea I ever had. It was completely watered down and full of crushed ice with barely tea in it. There was barely any boba in the drink as well. On top of that it was pricey. I don’t recommend going to this place if you want to get a boba drink.

This is a first for me. I don’t usually give 1 star but I feel it’s necessary to after my experience here… I walked in to an empty counter with one person behind it. That person stood there and looked at the cashier who was talking to a few people who were doing hookah. After standing there clueless for a few seconds, he came around to the counter to help me. I ordered a strawberry bubble tea and a mango bubble tea. He said they were out of strawberry so I ordered raspberry instead. He made the drinks which took about 5 minutes. I was the only customer waiting. I saw him walk back to the register and stand there for a second and then he says «ma’am. Your drinks are ready.» And just stands there and looks over to the «pick up counter» alllll the way across the room. I say «okay, thanks» and walk to get the drinks. I get in my car and decide to take a drink of my mango boba and it was horrible. I’ve had many mango bubble teas, in my lifetime, in fact I’ve had several from THIS place even after their ownership changed. It was the worst bubble tea that I’ve ever had. I tried the raspberry one and it was terrible as well. They both tasted like dirty melted crushed ice water. I decided to take them back in because I wasn’t going to waste almost $ 9 on something that gross that I was just going to throw away. When I went back in to ask the cashier if they don’t put sugar in their drinks, he immediately says «oh… Well we make our drinks with fresh fruit so that’s why it’s bitter.» First off: I never called it bitter. Second off: I’ve had many mango bubble teas made with fresh fruit and they have NEVER tasted bitter or gross. In fact, they have always tasted amazing. He then says «well… I can make it sweeter if you want it sweeter.» It wasn’t even the slightest bit sweet, hence why I asked if they even use sugar in their drinks. So, he takes the drinks back and after a couple minutes brings them back to me with no straws. I walked to the pick up counter and got them, Walked out and tasted them. The mango tasted slightly better due to the sugar but it was still unacceptable. The raspberry one was terrible. It tasted almost like perfume. It was bad. I didn’t like my experience here and won’t go back to this place again nor recommend it to anyone. I feel bad doing this, honestly but the owners need to fix these issues. After talking about my experience here, I’ve had several people agree with me. This place has gone majorly downhill. I don’t know if it’s just that one guy but if it is, they need to retrain him cause he’s driving the business down. I wrote this review mainly to express my disdain of the service received here. As I said, I don’t know if it’s just this one guy or the whole place but my experience was all in all pretty bad.

Yogurt fruit smoothies at $ 4. Some fresh fruit some frozen fruit. Nothing too special.

Boba drink was lukewarm and bitter with only a handful of tapioca. Was not impressed!

Nice atmosphere and great boba! Super willing to make any taste combinations you could want. Also have a sweet hookah patio outside. However, while they say they’re open until 12 – 2 am, tonight they were closing early due to a lack of staff and customers, so that was sort of a letdown. But I would totally go again!

This place was really unsanitary and the bubble tea was awful. The boba pearls are extremely mushy and unpalatable. There was no flavor to them. The tea was supposed to be cold but it was actually rather lukewarm even with the little bit of ice. All the tables and doors were sticky and had not been cleaned I assume from the day before because they had just opened when I visited. Not sure how this place has managed to stay open.

Wonderful service. Great bubbletea!

Got peach and mango green tea with tapioca. Firstly it is not a bubble tea, moreover there was no flavor of green tea. It was just some flavored water. Service was ok, but will never go back.

This place is awesome for hanging out! If you’re lucky you’ll catch a live band or live poetry. It’s BYOB (eer), so order yourself a nice hookah and tea. The only complaint is the patio, it’s rundown — they should really add some ambiance to it.

I visited Bubblehead for the first time during First Friday. To its credit, it has a very nice setup for live bands during that time. The wide-​open space in front of the building was filled with chairs and couches adorned with hookahs, and there was plenty of space for live bands and art stalls.
That being said, things got bad inside. Aesthetically, it has no charm. The inside is a drab white with some local art adorning the walls, but it was hard to get past how empty and grungy Bubblehead looked. Behind the scenes it looked like very little was going on. Bubble tea anywhere else is fun to watch, like seeing a barista on a classical espresso machine make a latte. None of that here; just a blank wall behind the register.
While service was prompt at the counter, the clerk knew very little about the flavors the shop served, and ended up giving a single-​flavor recommendation. For a place with a menu devoted completely to its different bubble tea flavors, its hookah menu was bare, and there was absolutely no upsell on any mixed or unique flavors. Any other hookah bar in San Antonio would have immediately been able to tell me about house mixes, but getting a single fruit recommendation was a disappointment.
As far as drinks are concerned, you’d be hard pressed to find anything else besides bubble tea. I went for a hot green tea, and was concerned when they served it up in a plastic cup. I don’t know if the cups used for bubble tea are heat resistant, and they certainly didn’t feel that way, so hopefully I won’t wake up one day with a stomach tumor from drinking melted plastic.
Service continued to be terrible. Though two young clerks were attentively trying to whittle down the line, a manager did pull one of them away during that time, as if there wasn’t a line to the door during that time, leaving only one to take care of any orders.
Our hookah order ended up taking a full 20 minutes before we even saw a hint of it. There were people who walked in afterward who received hookahs after us. Regardless of whether or not this was a busy night, I’ve sat in packed houses at Naara and Café Shisha and never waited that long for a pipe. It wasn’t like we ordered anything complex, either; it was a small hookah, one flavor, one hose. When it finally came, we were escorted outside to a patio, apparently not permitted to smoke hookah inside of the hookah bar. Our server promised to bring us mouthpieces, something almost any other hookah server anywhere carries on their person, but ended up never coming back. Not for mouthpieces, not to check our coals, not even to ask us how our crappy shisha tasted.
The hookah itself was grimy and tarnished and had not been cleaned properly, as the taste was burnt and harsh. Whoever decided to open this poor excuse for a hookah bar was a hookah amateur at best, and in a city with so much Middle Eastern influence, it is inexcusable how poor quality this session was.
Southtowners and Downtowners, it’s time to pick a new spot. I know this place serves hookah for dirt cheap, but I’d sooner spend the extra to go all the way to the Northwest side for good hookah.

My friend from work brought me a bubble tea from here today and it was ok! Not sure on the name of it but it has mango, pineapple and coconut flavors. It was pretty watered down and didn’t taste as fresh as the other bubble tea place I’ve been too. She also said its a hookah bar too… if you’re into that.lol.

After a post-​birthday dinner, our group headed here for boba. It’s a hookah/​boba place with a hole in the wall/​very austinite feel. I ordered a peach/​mango boba smoothie without boba and it was definitely the worst boba smoothie I’ve had (out of Tealicious in SA and multiple places in southern California). My drink was very watered down tasting and I’m pretty sure they don’t use real fruit at this place. The drink tasted artificial and I saw them putting pumps of syrup into my drink. My other friends thought there drinks were also watered down as well. The drink was drinkable, but it doesn’t compare to the mango smoothie I’ve had at Tealicious off of 1604 and Bandera.
Finally the parking lot is pretty crappy here and I question how hygienic this establishment is.

Yum! I couldn’t wait to try this local boba tea place and it did not disappoint! I made my own drink choosing watermelon, banana and green apple flavor with mango pearls — sooo good! Parking was easy and plentiful right in front. Spotted Taco Haven across the street and want to try that next time we are in Southtown. The only reason I’m giving this four stars is bc it seemed a little bit dirty inside and the residual hookah smoke was making my throat hurt but the boba tea was fabulous — give it a try!

Their bubble tea is all right. The tea is a little sweet and sugary and the bubbles were very soggy b/​c they were cooked too long. I don’t really like the vibe here either. No, I really don’t…It screams hipster wannabe.
Not sure if the store owner is Asian. I doubt it. I don’t usually trust non-​Asian people running a bubble tea place. Not judging, just saying!

Excellent source for bubble tea.
They serve an absolutely excellent product.
They have a menu just of the different mixes that other customer’s have created. Definitely worth a look. There are some good drinks on that menu. Or you can be creative and come up with your own blend of tasty.
It’s always bubble time at Bubblehead!

Awesome place to get bubble tea if you live near south San Antonio. This is the first bubble tea place I’ve been to that allow you to mix different flavors, and if you are new to bubble tea, staff there will also show you a list of flavors other customers have created to help you make decisions.
My order: Asian Yogurt Bubble Tea Slush

This place was pretty much the epitome of what I think is cool.
I stopped by after a trip to the San Antonio museum and the place isn’t located in the nicest spot… and it does look sketch BUT the style of the little café was pretty cool and hippie like. The tea tasted like any other bubble tea, but still good. I even ordered two servings. Didn’t try the hookah but will definitely try at the next visit.

San Antonio, give up this sorry excuse for a tapioca house (hidden inside an artsy slightly creepy hookah den) and come on over to Houston for some real «bubble tea» /​tea with boba.
The service here is slow as molasses, unfortunately. Took us 20 minutes to get two drinks! what the heck is that all about? Also, the tea is of inferior quality; I can taste it in the diluted iced green tea with boba/​tapioca pearls and the iced black tea with basil seeds… Man I can’t even begin to describe the latter. While the green tea with boba suffered from a real scarcity of boba (see picture), the black tea plus basil seed combo just tasted like sewage water. Or maybe cold basketball soup? Or perhaps the water used to clean the hookahs?
It’s clear to me that the tea is of secondary concern to this joint, which is fine; it’s apparent to me that’s there are so few other options in the area that Bubblehead can get away with this. However… If you’re coming here for hookah, I suggest you reconsider. During our twenty minute wait for our drinks we saw one of the guys on staff letting the mouthpiece of a hookah drag halfway across the floor of the establishment, before handing it to a patron. Yum, super hygienic!
Never coming back here again. If I have another boba craving while in SA, I will simply remind my self of the sewagey tasting dearth of options and wait till I can visit a café in Houston or elsewhere that doesn’t treat its drinks like an afterthought.

When Anthony M. and Brandon G. bought Bubblehead from Albert, they not only maintained the quality of their drinks but they built upon it. When I first heard about the new owners taking over in 2011, I was hesitant to go back to my favorite bubbletea house. But my doubts were far from accurate. The new guys added excellent flavor mixes and maintained prices. They even kept the frequent buyer card, which kept me happy.
I drive all the way from the Medical Center to get my fix. Make no mistake, this is the best bubbletea house in all of San Antonio, hands down. And I have tried others… the one in Loehmann’s Village that used to be on the corner of Callaghan and Babcock and the one on the corner of Huebner and Babcock. But I still keep going back to Bubblehead. What keeps me returning is the fast, courteous service, even on the busiest of days; quality ingredients; and wide selection of blends sure to satisfy everyone.
The décor is fun. Don’t miss the unique artwork. The sofa settings allow for large groups to sit together and talk, while the music is an excellent blend of ambient house and techno. I have not tried their hookah, but I see customers regularly indulging. There is a separate area for those who choose to try the hookah (the side of the building on a covered patio). The customers who just come for the bubbletea can sit comfortably inside or outside in front of the building. I also enjoy the extended hours on Friday and Saturday nights, which allows for late night hanging out.
Try Bubblehead just once and you will be hooked, just like me.