On Saturday, January 6, a food-centric festival will take over Poor Boys Bar when the New Orleans Tamale Festival makes its debut appearance.

Presented by Holly Tamale and Medina’s Good Tamale, the First Annual New Orleans Tamale Festival is free and open to the public, who will have a variety of tamales from vendors throughout the city to choose from. The all-ages event will include a tamale eating competition (which costs $5 to enter) and the crowning of the first New Orleans Tamal Queen and King. Naturally, there will be music included as this is New Orleans. Margie Perez (who will be performing at our Best of the Beat Awards ceremony on January 25), The Iguanas and Dat Band will provide the tunes.

As reported by the Gambit, the New Orleans Tamale Festival is the brainchild of Holly Hawthorne, also known as Holly Tamale, and Angela Harbold of Medina’s Good Tamales. “‘I thought, it’s really great that new Orleans has this great history of Delta-style tamales, but we didn’t have a festival that (celebrated) it,’ Hawthorne says. ‘This year, we decided to do it small, see what happens and maybe expand next year,'” reports the Gambit.

The New Orleans Tamale Festival takes place this Saturday at Poor Boys Bar (1328 St. Bernard Ave.) and runs from 12 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. For more information, visit the Festival’s Facebook page.