large tapioca
pearls
It would be fair to say that I have tried at least half a dozen different recipes for cooking large tapioca pearls. Some from books and some from the net, all with the same very unsatisfactory results.
They wold either still have that hard white dot centre or there would just be a pile of glug. Pre-soaking, several different cooking methods and times, nothing seemed to work.
Not liking to be beaten by culinary failure, recently when cleaning out my miscellaneous Asian noodle box I found some pearl tapioca and decided to give it one more try. This time YouTube and after watching a few different methods and timings I selected this one, and, so glad I did because it worked perfectly first time.
You can find the YouTube video here and I have outlined the method and result below. To be honest my grape juice and grapes was pretty ordinary, mainly because of the quality of the grapes. My favourite large ball tapioca is in sweetened coconut milk, with a few kaffir lime leaves and some grated lime rind and juice. Simple enough!
AO 7 March 2026
a two day process
day one
1500g cold filtered water
200g tapioca pearls
Bring the water to the boil, drop in the tapioca turn the heat down and stir. Cover with a lid and simmer for tthirth minutes, stirring from time to time.
Remove from the heat stand on a rack and leave covered, at room temperature overnight [my attempt rested for about fifteen hours].
day two
In a colander about twice the size of the volume of the congealed tapioca, using your hands to lift the tapioca through the running water, rinse it off three times and allow it to drain.
at this point, I was feeling skeptical as there were still quite large white uncooked dots in the middle of the tapioca.
Bring another 1500g of cold water to a gentle simmer, and the drained tapioca and simmer gently for thirty minutes, stirring from time to time.
Remove from the heat, cover and stand on a rack for thirty minutes. Rinse and use as required.
cook's note
Two hundred grams makes rather a lot and I think a half quantity would be plenty for six.
I haven’t tried cooking a half batch as yet but I would not halve the quantity of the cooking water and not go below one litre. Most cooks know that halving a recipe is most often not as simple as dividing a large quantity in half.
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