Sand Under My Feet: Alishan at The Alley

In this stressful time, especially because of the threat of the Covid virus and being on quarantine, people all over the world seek some comfort in food. Some dishes we can make at home and some are unavailable at this time. For me, one of my comfort food, or shall I say drink, is milk tea.

I am pretty much aware that not everyone has food on their table now because of the widespread lockdown. And I don’t want to sound insensitive and posting about food and leisure drinks. But to be honest, I’m slowly feeling some cabin fever. And blogging has always been my escape when I’m feeling stressed and so is food. Thus, I’m going to blog and I wish I can say I’m sorry if somebody finds that, me blogging is offensive to them, I need to keep my sanity too and this is just one action that can fulfill that.
The past two weeks, I’ve been craving for milk tea. I’ve tried several times to order online or via TNVS but failed. Earlier this morning, I decided to settle for a fast food milk tea and ask my mom to buy one for me when she goes out to do a grocery run. Unfortunately, the fast food chain near our place opens not until 10:00 am, so another try that failed.

There are quite a few milk tea shops in the area where my office building is located, and I frequent those that are less than 5 minutes’ walk. One of which is Alishan at the Alley. Alishan is a beverage shop with three branches: BGC, Makati and Greenhills and offers Brown Sugar Series, Milk teas and Fruit Teas. I believe Alishan is the first to introduce Brown and introduce Sugar Milk Tea series to Filipino milk tea lovers.
Alishan as the name suggests comes from the Alishan Mountains of Taiwan. Their High Mountain sourced ingredients have been specially grown and brought to the Philippines in order to give its clienteles an authentic Taiwanese milk tea experience.

When it comes to buying milk tea, there are a couple near where I work so, I rotate where I buy. So here are the drinks I’ve tried from Alishan.

Peach Passion Fruit Basil Fruit Tea – made with Alishan High Mountain green tea with pieces of peach, passion fruit and basil. The combination of ingredients in here may sound uncommon but I’m telling you it tastes nice.

White Rabbit Boba Ice Cream – White Rabbit candy was a popular vanilla-flavoured candy back in the 80-90s and was made as an ice cream flavor by Alishan. This soft served ice cream is exclusively available at their Ore Central, BGC branch. Out of curiosity, I bought a cup and shared with my teammates. The ice cream really tasted like the candy, it was overly sweet. It was plain with bobba toppings which somehow gave the ice cream some texture. Would I buy again? I think I will.

Jade Surprise – made with Alishan High Mountain green tea with pieces of kiwi fruit, cucumber and lemon. This was super citrusy yet refreshing.

Mango and Peach Fruit Tea – made with Alishan High Mountain green tea with pieces of mango and peach. Think about eating that popular dessert from a fast food chain, but a little less sweet and with some fragrant flavor of the green tea.

I have actually tried one of their Brown Sugar Milk Tea but forgot to take a photo of it. I found it too sweet for my liking, also the milk flavor was overpowering that I can’t even taste the tea anymore. I personally like their fruit teas more than the milk teas. The fruit teas have a distinct tea flavor with real fruits and are truly refreshing. If I feel like drinking a fruit tea, Alishan has always been my choice; for milk teas, I’ll probably get it from somewhere else. Their pearls have a good chew to them, I can’t say they’re my favorite though.

ALISHAN AT THE ALLEY

G/F Ore Central Building,
31st Street Corner 9th Avenue,
Bonifacio Global City, Taguig City

Contact Nos:

Email: alishanatthealley@gmail.com
Facebook: facebook.com/AlishanatTheAlley

Instagram: instagram.com/alishan.philippines

For more information, complete menu and restaurant reviews, check out their Zomato profile: