Kung Fu Tea

I visited here while traveling in the San Francisco area. I am a huge Boba Tea fan, and there is only one location in my hometown of Chandler, AZ that I love! I believe that I ordered a Jasmine Boba Milk Tea with the smallest amount of sweetener offered, if I remember correctly. It was delicious and delicately balanced. The cashier was super friendly and was prompt; he offered me a discount for checking in on Unilocal,which I gladly accepted. I would highly recommend this place for a delicious Boba beverage, and will be back during my next visit to San Mateo!

It’s ok!
I wish they had decaf tea options! Also, I wish there was a non boba option? Such as basil seeds (Tpumps has this) I miss Tpumps in the neighborhood.
The service is good — everyone is always attentive and nice.
It’s ok! Just be prepared for a caffeine kick.

Wow! I am quite excited to write this review, but not for the reason one might think. This place is definitely the lowest of the low in my book for milk tea. I was not only disappointed in the drink that I ordered, but I was disgusted, to say the least.
Inside the establishment was a ghost town. I decided to order the honeydew milk tea with tapioca. For about $ 5, I received a regular size with tapioca. The drink was beyond watered down. After I took a sip, the liquid evaporated from my tongue, and all that remained was pure powder. The drink was mixed poorly and had a strange flavor. It reminded me of bubble gum. Yes, that is right. Bubble gum. Last time I checked, honeydew is not supposed to taste like bubble gum. Are my taste buds off? Nahh I’m a Unilocal elite.
This place is the bottom of the barrel. The price tag is steep for a milk tea that not even ants would drink.
Kung Fu Tea, you do kung fu and tea injustice. You will get karate chopped.

After Old Town Sushi, I was walking down the street and passed by the macarons in the window of Kung Fu Tea House. I later stopped by to buy macarons for my friends and also to try their boba tea.
Macarons
–I bought 12 macarons, two of six different flavors: pistachio, strawberry champagne, rose, coffee, earl grey, and coffee. I got to try three of the flavors! First off regardless of the flavor, the macarons were very well made and were fresh! The tail was clearly visible, and the texture was chewy yet still crunchy! I thought the earl grey filling was only alright, but I thoroughly enjoyed both the rose and strawberry champagne fillings! Both were very creamy and went well with the macaron shells! I would rate these macarons a 4.5!
Milk Tea (Green) with Boba
–I wanted to see how their milk tea was so I ordered a medium milk tea green with 50% sweetness. I thought they gave way too much ice. After I finished the drink, a third of my cup was still ice. The milk tea itself was pleasant. The jasmine tea had a very intense Jasmine flavor but there was way too much milk in my opinion. The boba pearls were softer than grass jelly. This was a big disappointment and made me rate the drink a 3.
However, because the service was quite good, and I did like there stores ambiance, I rate my entire experience a 4!

This place looked neat. I enjoyed the artwork on the walls and was brought in by the fact that this boba spot was established in New York. But their drinks weren’t as good as expected. I liked being able to customize drinks but overall it wasn’t a good drink. We just ended up throwing away half of it.
We ordered a peach lychee oolong tea with boba and cotton candy. Couldn’t really taste the peach or lychee, just tea. And the cotton candy was not made correctly– there were too many thick chunks of sugar, it wasn’t fluffy.
Sorry Kung Fu.

It’s always hard to end a meal without something sweet so I came here because I know I liked the pineapple delight which I got again. This place still doesn’t have much seating, but they staff is finally well trained and I got my drink just the way I liked it. It was perfectly sweet and I loved the pineapple pieces at the bottom. This is the only thing that I ever get from here, but that is really all I need. My sister go a strawberry green tea and it was just okay. There’s so many other boba shops in SM where you can get that, but this is the only place that has that pineapple drink.

Kung Fu Tea is a narrow hallway into the ordering area. a few tables for sitdown.
milk teas pricey (4) décor is nice upscale ambience.
drink: earl grey black tea (2.75)
–earl grey tea kind of faint,
–ordered no sugar, little ice
disappointed in that
3.5 stars
drips:
–quick service, so tea probably premade.
–offerings on left side of wall near counter.
have to go to counter to see sign on left.

Since Tpumps closed a few doors down we decided to try Kung Fu Tea. We also had Kung Fu Tea in Vegas the week before and wanted to compare…
This location is better because they have more options than the Vegas spot. And they had my Lychee Milk Tea and offered to top it with Cotton Candy!
The service was a little slow and there weren’t very many people in the place.
My drink wasn’t cold and didn’t have much flavor but it did have actual pieces of Lychee in the drink.

Colorfully decorated hang out spot w/​comfy chairs if you want to grab your goods and chill.
Tasty drinks that come in Medium and Large sizes and adjustable sweetness level. For $ 0.99, you can pop fresh cotton candy on top of your drink… making it an instant skyscraper.
The best thing about this place? The macaroons! Not only are they beautifully colored and decorated, they also boast the perfect amount of chewiness and airy filling. $ 1.90/piece or $ 1.75 if you buy 6+.

Beyond the fact that boba isn’t all that healthy, I really wasn’t looking to try yet another boba joint in the area now that ShareTea is firmly entrenched as my go-​to spot in San Mateo (and the peninsula, for that matter). However, after hearing some good things about Kung Fu Tea from a couple of friends in Boston, I practically felt compelled to check them out. You know, for the sake of Unilocal.
Now, I don’t know whether or not they’ve been overshadowed by the presence of TPumps down the block, but I was surprised to see just a couple of people inside when we all walked in on a Wednesday night. Much like with their seating, the menu doesn’t offer a ton, but it covers the basics, with an array of teas, milk teas, and slushes to choose from. And while I didn’t try one, I thought the variety of macarons they sell was a refreshing change from the typical snacks you see, like popcorn chicken.
Per my usual routine, I ordered a regular BLACK MILK TEA WITH (less) BOBA, which is my standard measuring stick. While I appreciated how fast my drink was made (as well as the friendly service), I was worried when I saw it come out. Sadly, my first sip confirmed it — a bit too much cream. However, that was nothing compared to how sweet it was. Which is a shame too since both the boba (slightly chewy) and the tea that I could taste were pretty good.
Given how they offer several levels with less sugar (less, half, little, and zero), simply tweaking the sweetness might actually make for a decent drink. Even as is though, Kung Fu Tea is still better than TPumps (based on what I had at the latter’s Irving location in SF). Still, I’ll just stick with ShareTea if/​when I’m in downtown San Mateo and in search of some milk tea. Assuming there isn’t another interesting boba joint they manage to squeeze into the area…

Boba hailing from the east coast, or as they say it «bubble tea»!
boba shops are popping up everywhere in San Mateo and Kung Fu tea joins the family of boba stores that currently reside there. I’m always excited to try new boba places and I never got a chance to try this in NY which is where there HQ is but, I figure given its notoriety in NY, it should be good here.
Right off the bat, if you couldn’t tell this is from NY, their décor will tell you. It screams NY with the drawings of subway terminals and stops. The shop is vibrant and clean. They only have 3 small tables for two or three, so definitely more of a to-​go type place. I got their golden oolong milk tea at 50% sweet. I don’t know what the difference is between «golden» and regular. To me, it tasted like a regular oolong milk tea but sounds cooler. The drink at 50% sweetness was less sweet than I expected. Usually 50% in other places are still somewhat sweet but theirs was less in comparison so their sugar levels aren’t high which is good for me! They have a milkier taste to their drinks so if you’re more of a tea person, this place won’t cut it since the tea kind of gets lost in the milk, but I like creamier drinks: D
Overall I thought it was decent but my favorite in the area is still sharetea since they blend the tea and milk better in my opinion. I would still definitely come back to try their other drinks and it’s conveniently close to the movie theatre and caltrain station!

Check in for a free upgrade?! Score!
Lots of selection, but we ordered passionfruit green tea with 70% sweetness. I was wanting more sweetness in my tapioca balls. A good pearl tea place needs to have good pearls. I found the consistency of the pearl to be nice and chewy, but it needed more sweetness! It had very little sweetness, which makes kung fu tea less appealing to me. Service was good, and the girl helping us was very nice.

This shop is located two doors down from CREAM. Tpumps and Tea River are also located a couple of doors away. Very narrow shop, there’s only 3 tables inside so not geared for large groups to sit around and hang out. Since this shop is located in downtown San Mateo, there’s either street metered parking or paid parking garages nearby. In the evenings, it is generally pretty hard to find parking unless you park further away from the center of downtown. Fairly standard drink options, they do allow you to adjust both the level of ice and sweetness.
After a group dinner, a bunch of people wanted to get ice cream at CREAM. I’m not a fan of CREAM, so I went to Kung Fu Tea to try them out since I know they’re a very popular East Coast chain.
Menu as of 12/​20/​2014
*~ Classic ~* Med /​Lg /​Hot
KF Honey Tea: $ 2.75 /​$ 3.50 /​$ 3.50
Jasmine Green Tea: $ 2.75 /​$ 3.50 /​$ 3.50
Signature White Gourd Tea: $ 2.75 /​$ 3.50 /​$ 3.50
Earl Grey Black Tea: $ 2.75 /​$ 3.50 /​$ 3.50
Golden Oolong Tea: $ 2.75 /​$ 3.50 /​$ 3.50
KF Citron Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3.75
Honey Green Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3.75
White Gourd Green Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3.75
Longan Honey Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3.75
*~ Signature ~*
KF Milk Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.95 /​$ 3.95
KF Milk Green Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.95 /​$ 3.95
KF Oolong Milk Tea: $ 3 /​$ 3.95 /​$ 3.95
Taro Milk Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4 /​$ 4
Taro Milk Green Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4 /​$ 4
Oreo Milk Green Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4 /​$ 4
Coconut Milk Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4 /​$ 4
Almond Milk Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4 /​$ 4
Coffee Milk Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4 /​$ 4
*~ Slush ~* (Med: $ 4.25 /​Lg: $ 5)
Pineapple
Passionfruit
Signature Coffee
Mango
Matcha Red Bean
Taro
Italian Mocha
Caramel Macchiato
Mung Bean
Red Bean
Strawberry Milk
*~ Yogurt~* (Med /​Lg)
Green Tea: $ 3.50 /​$ 4.50
Lemonade: $ 4 /​$ 5
Orange Juice: $ 4 /​$ 5
Grapefruit Juice: $ 4 /​$ 5
*~ Milk ~* (Med: $ 4 /​Lg: $ 5 /​Hot: $ 5)
Chai Milk
Matcha Milk
Ginger Milk
White Gourd Milk
Regular Wow Milk: WOW Milk = Lactose-​free milk
Red Bean Wow Milk
Mung Bean Wow Milk
Herbal Jelly Wow Milk
*~ Punch ~* Med /​Lg
Honey Lemonade: $ 3.25 /​$ 4
Lemon Black Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4
Lemon Green Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4
Mango Green Tea: $ 3.50 /​$ 4.50
Orange Green Tea: $ 3.50 /​$ 4.50
Grapefruit Green Tea: $ 3.50 /​$ 4.50
Sunshine Pineapple Tea: $ 3.50 /​$ 4.50
Passion Fruit Green Tea: $ 3.25 /​$ 4.25
*~ Espress ~* Med /​Lg /​Hot
Signature Coffee: $ 2.50 /​$ 3.50 /​$ 2.50
Mocha: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3
Latte: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3
Cappuccino: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3
Caramel Macchiato: $ 3 /​$ 3.75 /​$ 3
Extra Espresso Shot: $ 1
Ice Level: Regular /​Less /​None
Sweetness Level: Extra (120%) /​Regular (100%) /​Less (70%) /​Half (50%) /​Little (30%) /​Zero
Add-​ons (+$ 0.50): Bubble /​Herbal Jelly /​Nata (Coconut) Jelly /​Red Bean /​Mung Bean /​Mango
Our Order:
Hot Taro Milk Tea w/​Bubble
Golden Oolong Milk Tea w/​Bubble
We forgot to make our drinks less sweet and low ice. My drink was mostly milky and sweet so I hardly tasted any of the golden oolong tea and was a bit too sweet for me. =(It was the very last of the batch of golden oolong tea, so it could’ve been because of that as well. My BF’s hot taro milk tea had just enough sweetness and he enjoyed it. He’s the type of person who prefers very low sweetness though. With so many milk tea shops around, competition is going to be fierce. Plus that they’re open later than ShareTea but definitely not as good.

Kung Fu Tea was first introduced to me by my cousin when I was in Flushing, NY. It was delicious! When I found out Kung Fu Tea opened up a shop in San Mateo and I was also in the area, I was super excited to have it again!
I got the Kung Fu Black Tea and it did not disappoint! It was delicious! You can definitely taste the tea flavor and I love that! I didn’t need to ask the girl to change the level the sweetness! It was perfect!
Remember to check in with Unilocal to get a free size upgrade!
Kung Fu Tea is definitely my favorite milk tea spot now!

I tried the oolong milk tea with grass jelly with 60% sugar. It had a good flavor but I wish the tea flavor was a bit stronger. It’s also nice that you can get medium or large sizes; at Sharetea it’s pretty much only large.
I also thought it was cool that they sold macarons, so I decided to splurge $ 10 – 11 and bought 6. From what I remember:
— Mango: not a strong mango flavor but too sweet
— Passion fruit: same comment as the mango one
— Raspberry: sweet, but a good raspberry tart
— Almond: Largely overpowered by sweetness; not much almond flavor
In summary, they’re all very sweet; probably too sweet for some people’s taste.

The size of the drinks is the standard, when a large is about 24 ounces. Its just a few doors down from tpumps. Staff is friendly and helpful. I did the check in after they started making my drink already and they remade it for me x] so grateful. They also have a random super old school television set that plays movies via VHS. (RANDOM lolz) Street parking so grab what you can. Bring change for meters!
That have a suggested top 8, my friend got the passion fruit green tea less sugar. I was going to get the matcha milk but i wanted a tea so i strayed from the top 8 and got the oolong milk tea less sugar.
**OOLONG MILK TEA**
the oolong is really strong. You can really taste the tea. I would definitely come back here just for the oolong milk tea (if I’m in the area). Maybe do less ice so that your drink doesn’t get diluted. It takes me a while to finish a large. But overall loved it!
–passion fruit green tea: it tasted like passion fruit water. The green tea wasn’t strong so even though there was less sugar you couldn’t taste any green tea and I love the bitter after taste of tea. Wouldn’t recommend that to the tea lovers.
Will definitely come back. I do want to see what other drinks they have that are good.

An up-​and-​coming bubble tea place!
It’s tough to operate a bubble tea place when Tpumps is right next door, but the Kung Fu Tea folks are putting up their best effort. The wait staff is super nice (and good looking too!), and they even gave everyone free upgrades from Medium to Large on Labor day. Dang!
Unfortunately, they did well in everything except the quality of the drinks – I ordered a honey black tea, and sure enough, it was filled with large doses of pure syrup. And also tapioca, which I told them I didn’t want any when ordering… lack of experience perhaps?
Overall it seems like they are trying their best! I look forward to coming back again and finding reasons to increase the rating to something higher :(

I’ve been to one in NYC and thought it was just ok.
But I decided to give it another try.
I got the golden oolong milk tea. Not bad but not great.
The boba was way too hard and chewy for my taste.

This area of downtown San Mateo has become a hub excellent boba (‘pearl’)/Hong Kong milk tea and snacks. I’m liking this spot for citron tea I ordered, which is black tea and about ¼ citrus rind shaken until it looks milky when served. There was a bitterness and citrus tart flavor that made an excellent counter to the rich, often sweet macaroons they also sell in the café. I personally found the pistachio to be crunchy (has actual pistachio nuts in it) and the cream filling dense. In other words, delicious.
I loved the graffiti wall art and the mod style chairs. 90s rap/R&B in the background made me feel right at home when I walked in. It gives Kung Fu Tea a vibe I normally feel when I find something near in San Francisco’s Mission district.
Card is accepted for purchases over $ 10 but cash is encouraged. I can easy meet that requirement just buying macaroons.

Hi-​Yah!
… get it?
Kung Fu Tea is the new addition to San Mateo with hopes of filling your milk tea needs. It’s located on the same block at Tpumps and on the left side of Cream! Since this is downtown San Mateo, parking is all on the streets and parking garages.
The inside of this place is long instead of wide. They only had 2 chairs set up so far and based on the width of this place… I’m pretty sure this isn’t a sit down and enjoy kind of place. More like a take home and enjoy.
Their menu consist of only a few choices in each category so it isn’t overwhelming and they do have some interesting flavors like tomato honey twister. However, because it is currently their soft opening, they are out of coffee, yogurt, and herbal jelly! And they are currently cash only and accept fivestars reward! AND THEY SELL MACARONS. From what I saw, they seem to sell a decent selection of flavors so I’ll definitely check that out next time. :)
Service was friendly. One of the workers were nice enough to inform us of their free upgrade and told us what they were currently missing. They also offer free samples on their counter for you to try.
I got their kung fu bubble milk tea and my cousin opted for their sunshine pineapple tea. My cousin seemed to enjoy hers while I was a bit iffy on mine. The boba was a bit firmer than what I was used to and there was an after taste with the milk tea that threw me off. My boyfriend said it tasted a little sour? Not sure.
Overall, would probably come back. There’s other things I want to try and I’m excited to see how well Kung Fu Tea is gonna do in San Mateo. I’ll update when I come back and try other drinks and macarons. ;)