Week Two: I'm Slowly Getting the Hang of these Blogs: Coco's Cafe

Tapioca pearl drinks
Photo credit to Benjamin Munsayac

Why, hello..... again...

For today, I've had the great epiphany of ranting about another aspect of my busy life, which would, simply put, be Chinese School. Well, of course I'm not going to talk about Chinese school directly and risk the possibility of boring you guys to death, I'm going to talk about a something I guess you could call a tradition.

My dad has gotten into the habit of taking my brother and I, and my mom if she's not grocery shopping, to a lovely little restaurant around Austin called Coco's Cafe. It is a Pearl Drink shop (and if any of you don't know what tapioca is, you should definitely fix that) and a Taiwanese restaurant. There are two locations: one is located near the UT campus and the other (which happens to be located conveniently on the way to Chinese School) is near the Hong Kong Supermarket (which actually may have just closed down recently...).

So... The interesting stuff (as it seems that my rambling does get a little boring): My favorite thing to order at Coco's Cafe is (obviously) one of their pearl drinks. Seeing as I'm a boring person and I am not that picky of an eater, I usually just go with the classic strawberry and banana smoothie with tapioca pearls. But my dad (though I sometimes do not recommend listening to his eating suggestions) really likes the passion fruit smoothie, the avocado (yes, it sounds nasty; don't ask me) smoothie and the mango. I really like their noodles, especially any of their soup noodles. I personally really liked their pork wonton noodle soup, and as I am a picky eater when it comes to meat and Asian foods, I really do think that it is a nice entree. Something that my brother really enjoys is the green onion pie, which, I know, sounds kind of gross, but it's basically something like a really crisp pizza crust (almost) that's been flavored and seasoned with green onions. It's huge, and double-layered, so don't go ordering a full pie and try to finish it by yourself. There might be a little misunderstanding similar to the one we experienced on Twin Day for our lovely teachers.

I believe both locations are open around 10:30 AM every morning, during which they begin to serve from their lunch menus. Their homepage is here. I suggest you stop by sometime. At the location in downtown, since parking is so scarce, we often only go after having other events around the UT campus that day. The central Austin location has plenty of parking and is located in the middle of a shopping center that also contains a Target.

This is Coco's Cafe, downtown Austin, just across the street from the UT Campus.

Photo credit to Larry Miller.

Thanks

Lily