The Alley da 더앨리코리아

When it comes to bubble tea, among all the other popular international chains in Seoul, there is another with an animal mascot. The Alley’s mascot is a buck. The first time I went was after Marie Antoinette. I’d been wanting to visit one for awhile and there was a little one in the food court near the Egg Drop I went to.  I ordered one of their prettiest drinks, one of their aurora series, which is icy fruit tea that almost tastes like juice. There are two flavors morning dawn and northern lights. Each 6,500 won. They come only iced and only in this container.

It’s absolutely beautiful. The above pictured blue and red with a little bit of purple is their Northern Lights drink. It’s a grape infused tea that takes them awhile to make. I ordered this after dinner time at a food court, but when I went to another location around lunch time with a friend who tried to order it she was told that they didn’t make it until after 2pm. You also are meant to shake it up before drinking it. I hadn’t planned to sit around and drink it there so I put it in my bag and on my journey  home it got pretty shaken up and turned into a very dark spooky looking red.

I thought it was quite good but I wanted to try one of their more famous drinks which is of course their bubble teas, specifically their Brown Sugar Deerioca Milk series. Deerioca is the name they give their handmade from scratch tapioca pearls. Which….look awkwardly…now that I think about it… like deer poo.

I went to their shop in Myeongdong which was quite nice looking and had more seating then the food court shop did (which had one seat so the bar was low).

I tried their number 1 menu item which was a brown sugar Deerioca while my friend tried their green tea version. We had them in the cafe so they came in really cute reusable bubble tea cups with reusable straws.

The Alley is originally a bubble tea chain from Taiwan and can be found in many countries. I think it’s got a fun vibe and I like the drink options and that they do non-bubble tea in some aesthetically pleasing ways. As well as the fact they have cute reusable cups and straws that look like the traditional take away cups for bubble tea.

Their hours change depending on location. But it generally seems to be from about 10/10:30am until about 8pm.