Photo by Jenna Nicastro
By Jenna Nicastro
The idea of having an entire festival dedicated to collard greens made Boyzell Hosey and Samantha Harris laugh. However, when they started thinking about the impact they could have with the festival, it did not seem silly anymore.
The Tampa Bay Collard Greens Festival made its debut in 2018 with the goal of uniting the community through people’s love for collard greens and curiosity toward nutrition. Hosey and Harris took inspiration from the Collard Cultural Festival outside of Atlanta and transformed an idea into an annual celebration with a cook-off, vendors from all over the nation, informative classes, and more.
Hosey, who is also the senior editor of visual storytelling for ProPublica, said the idea sprouted from his wife and church’s love for greens, and slowly developed into an annual celebration.
Hosey had influenced his co-founder, Harris, that his new way of cooking greens in an instapot was nothing short of revolutionary. He strayed away from the traditional way of cooking collard greens on the stove top and introduced a faster technique that allows more creativity while cooking. Hesitant at first, Harris eventually tried the greens and said she was “amazed,” and has been cooking her collard greens like that ever since.
This led Harris and Hosey to begin their own annual cook-off where they create new recipes for collard greens. Harris described some of the changes that they made to their recipes each year and took pleasure in including the fact that this year she had won their competition. Some of the ingredients that she added to her winning recipe were siracha and garlic-infused oil, veggie bouillon cubes, sazon seasoning, and more.
They were eager to share their new way of preparing collard greens with the community and started selling them before church.
Members of their church would arrive before mass and Sunday school to get some of their greens.
Harris and Hosey’s success influenced them to begin searching for a way to use their love for greens to involve people from all over the city.
The Tampa Bay Collard Greens festival has gone from a handful of vendors to around 180, Hosey said.
The enormous growth of the festival over the past eight years had taken a toll on both of the founders.
Harris had decided to leave her previous job in 2024 to fully commit to the festivals and be able to “hone in on the relations part of it,” Harris said.
Most of the current vendors are homemade businesses that sprouted from simple inspiration.
One of these businesses is Mango Genesis, created by Anisa Matin. She makes various types of jewelry using mango husks that she bleaches, sanitizes, and dries.
Matin had always been a creative person. When she had opened a mango one day, she noticed the “perfect symmetry,” of the seeds and “thought it would make a great canvas,” Matin said.
Another vendor that appeared at the festival was Fitzpatrick’s Sweet Tea, created by Stephanie and Stevie Fitzpatrick. The sisters started their tea business when they were in fifth grade and had chosen tea because it was an “out of the box” product that “not a lot of people sell,” Stephanie said.
The festival also offered mental health classes given by professionals, workout sessions, cooking classes, and more.
Hosey and Harris took the festival a step further than any other and provided not only a fun day but also an educational one.
According to Harris, educating the community about nutrition has always been their main goal.
It is also something they “feel got lost over the years.” The duo thinks their mission is important because, “there are alarming health disparities in the black and brown community,” that can be solved by watching “what we eat and from what food sources,” Harris said.
