Boba and Raindrop Cakes at Vanitea Cafe

Jake, T and I were down in the South Land (aka Chula Vista) having dinner at our favorite Mandarin Chinese Restaurant for Father’s Day. T wanted to treat his dad to dinner and after our meal I wanted to check out Vanitea Cafe for a little post-dinner dessert.

Vanitea Cafe is located off Telegraph Canyon Road. It’s near the “other” Mandarin restaurant (Mandarin Canton) but we prefer the one that’s across the street from Southwestern College.

The Raindrop Cake was the item I was interested in trying. No price listed. Hmm. 

The case of pretty macarons caught my eye. Since I was already planning on other sweet things, I opted to try only one.

I got the Tiger Milk Tea [$3.50] with Boba and Jake got the Horchata Milk Tea [$3.25]. Boba is extra but I have no idea how much extra since the price isn’t listed and I didn’t get my receipt. If you check in on Yelp, you get free boba though. Silly me forgot to adjust the sweetness on our teas so they were both a tad too sweet for me. But that’s my fault – UGH. The Tiger Milk Tea is a combination of Thai tea with regular Milk Tea. Thai tea is usually unbearably sweet for me, and this combination was a nice twist – it’s like Thai tea “lite”. I still needed it to tone down on the sweetness level though so I’d definitely go with less sugar on that sucker. The flavor was good but in general I prefer regular old milk tea.

Jake was going to get the Taro (his standby favorite) and decided to try the Horchata instead. He commented it didn’t really taste like horchata – more like a milk tea with some cinnamon in it. 

They have clear boba here instead of the dark round globs we are used to. Tastes about the same though. 

The one macaron I got was the Black Sesame macaron. I quite liked the flavor of this one. It was nutty-ish and the macaron shell was light and chewy. This was my favorite item here at Vanitea! 

I showed T a photo of the cotton candy cloud and he instantly wanted one. He let me choose what flavor to get him so I got a Mango Snow Bubble [$4.00] with a vanilla cotton candy cloud. Yup, I have no idea how much extra it is to get a cloud. Luckily it’s dramatic looking enough to make me forget the added costs. They swirl the cloud around the top of the drink, creating this mystical magical puff on top. The cotton candy is available in different flavors, but I figured vanilla would pair well enough with the mango drink.

The cotton candy is too sweet for my tastes, but I quite enjoyed the Mango Snow Bubble. It’s pretty much like a slushie. I have no idea why it’s called a Snow Bubble. Cause it’s…. icy, I guess? 

T loved his cotton candy cloud. Obviously! 

I told T that boba was optional for the snowy bubble drinks but that I just didn’t get boba for him. He loved the mango snow bubble so much he wanted to try another one with boba in it and bought himself a Watermelon Snow Bubble with boba this time. He loved both drinks but preferred the watermelon over the mango. Both tasted like sweet fruity slushies to me. 

Here’s the insta-famous Raindrop Cake. I guess they call it a “cake” because that sounds better but don’t be fooled into thinking it tastes anything like a cake. It’s more like a globby jelly thing. It looks hella cool, I’ll give them that, but the taste/flavor was kind of “ehhh” for me.

The raindrop cake by itself doesn’t taste like much. It’s a neutral flavor and the syrup (kuromitsu – sort like a lighter molasses) and roasted soybean flour give it the flavor. The kuromitsu syrup (on the right) made it too sweet for me. The soybean flour didn’t really help out my tastebuds, either. The consistency is smoother than Jell-O. It kind of melts away smoothly into your mouth. But you’ll probably keep thinking “It’s like I’m eating clear Jell-O” anyway. 

I took some of the soybean powder and dusted the top and said, “Look, it’s like in Indiana Jones!” T didn’t get my joke but Jake did. If you don’t get it either, watch this video to see what I meant.

I’m including this photo of Jake just cause it makes me laugh. 

Vanitea Cafe
525 Telegraph Canyon Road
Chula Vista, CA 91910