Hot Tamale! Here’s a review of It’s Tamale Time, a place you’ll want for three meals a day

It’s Tamale Time is settled on Pierce Road in Phenix City with a second location on the way. Walking up to the restaurant, you can smell the aroma of cooked pork, chorizo, brisket, chicken, and other meat wafting through the air.

As you walk in there’s a bench to the left and few chairs to the right for people to wait for their food, and they serve tamales, tamales and more tamales.

I decided to get one tamale with the original pork filling as is custom for the dish. The other two tamales I got filled with chorizo sausage, as I will always be a sucker for the burst of flavor that comes from all the hot and smoky spices that fill these sausages.

The pork was super soft and thinner than strands of cotton with a clean pork flavor wrapped in a warm juicy breaded outside that could be eaten with just your gums if you didn’t have teeth.

I topped each bite off with the Salsa Fresca and El Sriracho hot sauces which were worthy of a story by themselves. One had a dark and earthy flavor with cilantro easily detectable, while the other left a slight burn in my mouth for a few seconds after each bite and had a brighter flavor.

Both were smooth in texture and paired well with the meat in the tamales without overshadowing their flavor.

The tamales are very affordable for this reporter and I will definitely be back time and again when it’s Tamale Time yet again.

Editor’s note: Ledger-Enquirer breaking news reporter Kelby Hutchison is our staff foodie and will occasionally write reviews of local restaurants. If you have a suggestion, e-mail him a khutchison@ledger-enquirer.com.