Big Boba News

Dallas scores fix for trendy Taiwanese tea and shaved snow in Deep Ellum

Get your boba fix at this new dessert shop.

Photo courtesy of Bobaddiction

After decades without, Dallas proper is finally going to get boba, the trendy tea with chewy tapioca "pearls." Bobaddiction, the tea-themed food truck, is opening in Deep Ellum, taking over the space previously occupied by Monkey King Banana Stand, the dessert shop whose goods are now for sale at sibling concept Monkey King Noodle Co.

Bobaddiction was founded in 2013 by Randy Hu and two friends who launched their food truck to bring an authentic boba tea option to Uptown and downtown Dallas. The truck also serves the Taiwanese treat called shaved snow. Fans love the jasmine milk tea and passionfruit green tea, and the creamy shaved snow, delicately shaven into layers of snow-like ribbons and covered with fresh fruits and condensed milk.

Hu, who now runs the operation on his own, says that he was sharing a kitchen, storage, and parking space with 20-plus other food trucks and simply needed a dedicated spot.

"The Deep Ellum space is absolutely perfect," he says. "It's big enough to be a kitchen and storage, and also has a gated area in the back to park our two food trucks."

He'll use it as the central brew kitchen, making all the drinks and boba for the two trucks, plus their kiosks on SMU, UTD, and UT Arlington campuses. He's also opening an outlet in Frisco in 2018.

Having a Deep Ellum storefront was almost gravy on the potatoes.

"Originally we just planned to have the location as our central brew kitchen and sell a small menu," Hu says. "But business has been great, so we pulled out all the big guns, redesigning the walls, putting up animations on LCDs, and extending the menu to a full-blown drink and dessert shop."

The menu includes signature boba tea flavors from the truck, but he's added several other permanent drink flavors and a tea of the month.

"While the truck only does boba tea, our store is a full-on Asian drink and dessert shop, serving boba teas, fresh fruit shaved-snow desserts, mochi ice cream, ice cream, and pastries," Hu says.

Bobaddiction has been savvy about finding companion revenue streams to fill the gap when people aren't ordering boba tea every day. That includes merchandise such as T-shirts, tank tops, hoodies, beanies, and calendars with crafty designs such as their new Chinese Zodiac Animal Series, all sold on Amazon.

Even with a permanent location, he'll still run both trucks regularly, doing birthday, graduation, and wedding events, as well as normal stands at college campuses. "We are really proud of our truck, we really do work nonstop, and love our fans," Hu says. "People have even made birthday cakes of our logo and drink! We just want everyone to love boba like we do."

desserts deep-ellum coffee

Tres chic

Deep Ellum bar duo to open bohemian French restaurant in Bishop Arts

Courtesy Peter Novotny

The in-progress exterior of Trapeze

A new French-inspired restaurant and bar from the team behind two Deep Ellum hot spots will soon make its debut in Dallas' Bishop Arts District: Called Trapeze, it will open this spring in a cute bungalow at 240 W. 8th St.

Trapeze is from Peter Novotny and Dan Murry, who operate popular Deep Ellum haunts Ruins and Armoury D.E. They have been remodeling the old Bishop Arts bungalow extensively for their newest restaurant venture.

“It’s basically going to be kind of a French bohemian bar and restaurant, with real emphasis on the bohemian,” Novotny says. “It will kind of feel like an old-fashioned bohemian artist’s enclave.”

Matt Battaglia, the founder of the now-defunct Denton music festival Oaktopia and current tour manager for musician Marc Rebillet, is also involved in the project.

The space itself underwent a massive revamp that’s been in the works for months, including a few weather-induced delays. And because Trapeze is located in a conservation district, that construction had to be done in a way that would maintain the home’s original look.

“It’s basically a complete renovation,” Novotny says. “They had to rebuild the entire structure. The whole exterior is all new.”

Novotny says that the inspiration for Trapeze comes from Oak Cliff’s own historical French influence. That will be reflected in the space’s “quirky” vibe, which he says will be very colorful and in keeping with the bohemian theme.

The neighborhood was once home to the French utopian community La Reunion, which sprouted up around 1855.

“We’re trying to do a tribute to the French history of Oak Cliff and Bishop Arts, and our goal is to capture the things we love about regional French cuisine and culture,” he says.

To head up the kitchen at Trapeze, Novotny and Murry tapped Jeremy Spector, a New York chef who’s worked in much-lauded kitchens like Balthazar and Gramercy Tavern, along with owning and operating his own restaurants in the city, as culinary director. Spector is developing the menu for the restaurant, which will serve classic dishes from the different regions of France, along with flavors inspired by France’s once-vast colonial empire, including Moroccan cuisine.

As one might expect from two Deep Ellum bar experts, the cocktail program at Trapeze will be serious. Expect classic French cocktails, New Orleans-influenced libations, and an extensive list of cognacs, rhum agricoles, and “many other classic French spirits and liqueurs,” Novotny says. The bar will also offer a solid menu of aperitifs and digestifs, along with cocktails mixed with absinthe, cognac, and Chartreuse, and French and “French-adjacent” cider and beer.

Novotny and Murry are shooting for an opening date in April, just in time for what will hopefully be good spring weather.

bishop arts deep ellum openings