“What does tamarind taste like?”

We were at a Mexican grocery store food court in California with a friend from Serbia pondering flavored drinks. While I searched for the right descriptors, an employee offered him a tamarind agua fresca sample. Nothing beats actually trying it: sweet and sour, light and deep.

That was on my mind when I tasted a horchata boba drink one afternoon in Los Altos. Culinary fusion is next-level in the Bay Area. The creamy, subtly-spiced Mexican drink contrasted delightfully with dark, chewy Taiwanese tapioca pearls.

After Guillaume brought home a box of whole tamarind pods on a whim, I imagined tamarind boba must be someone’s specialty out here.