Classic black tea with milk — customizable sweetness, served iced. The traditional pairing drink for dim sum and dumplings, rooted in the Hong Kong milk tea tradition. At $5.50 it's the most versatile drink on the menu: order it sweet, order it light, order it with boba pearls added on request.
Milk tea has a longer history in Chinese dining than boba — the Hong Kong–style milk tea tradition dates to the British colonial period, when strong black tea was adapted with local evaporated milk to create one of the most distinctive drinks in Chinese cuisine. The Ugly Dumpling Milk Tea follows this lineage: black tea as the base, milk to soften the tannins, sweetness to balance.
The serving here is iced and customizable — you choose your sweetness level from full to zero, and ice level from standard to none. At full sweetness it's a smooth, milky tea-flavored drink. At 25% sugar or zero, it becomes a more austere, genuinely tea-forward experience where you taste the black tea's natural bitterness and the milk's richness without sugar masking either.
The best use of a Milk Tea on this menu is as a dim sum and dumpling pairing. The tannins in black tea are natural fat-cutters — they lift the palate between bites of fried or steamed dumplings and reset your sense of flavour. It's the same logic behind serving tea at every dim sum restaurant in Hong Kong: the food tastes better when you're drinking tea alongside it.
| Nutrition | Full sugar | 50% sugar | No sugar |
|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | ~220 | ~170 | ~90 |
| Total Sugars | ~32g | ~16g | ~5g |
| Protein | ~5g | ~5g | ~5g |
| Caffeine | ~50mg | ~50mg | ~50mg |
| Allergen | Present |
|---|---|
| Milk / Dairy | Yes |
| Gluten / Wheat | No |
| Tree Nuts / Peanuts | No |
| Eggs | No |
| Soy | No |
Dim sum and milk tea have been served together for over a century. The pairing works because tea tannins are natural fat-cutters — they cleanse the palate between bites and make the food taste brighter.
No other beverage on the menu offers the same range of customization. Adjust sweetness from zero to full, ice from none to standard, and optionally add boba pearls. It's the drink you can dial in exactly to your taste.
At $5.50 it's $0.50 less than the Brown Sugar Boba and offers a more versatile flavour profile. If you don't want the sweetness of boba, Milk Tea at reduced sugar is the sharper, more nuanced choice.
