NATCHEZ — Southwest Mississippi is better known for its Muscadine wine than for ciders, but Saturday evening, it was the smell of spiced fruits that drew pilgrims to downtown Natchez.

The Natchez Downtown Development Association opened the year’s Second Saturday events with a friendly cider-making competition between downtown merchants.

NDDA spokeswoman Yvonne Murray said the first-time contest was part of the group’s efforts to draw as many people into downtown during 2014 as it can.

The contest was judged by popular vote, and those who ladled cider to the manifold judges were stationed inside their respective businesses.

“We did it that way because we wanted to get people inside the locations to see what they had,” Murray said.

“Cider is easy for people to put an individual spin on, so they can take this drink and make it reflect an individual creativity, make it uniquely theirs.”

Marbeth Schon of M. Schon Gallery offered a cider of pears, oranges, cloves, cinnamon and brown sugar.

But Saturday’s event was as much about getting people to see what is unique in downtown as it was about cider, she said.

“It is about getting people going from place to place, and if we get more people going from place to place, going in and out of the shops, that is a good thing,” Schon said.

In the end, Schon’s cider was voted the best of the batch, followed by Natchez Arts Center in second place and a tie for Pearl Street Pasta and Natchez Manor at third.

The cider contest was inspired in part by a waffle contest Murray said she saw in Canton last year.

“After Christmas, everybody is sort of let down because the holidays are over, so we thought this might get people to come into downtown if we had something a little different,” she said.

“At the waffle contest, it seemed like everybody had a lot of fun, so we wanted to do something similar.”

In addition to the evening offerings, the Second Saturday event had a free public reading of a story about American Indian culture for children and a scavenger hunt at participating downtown stores.

“The children were really excited, and they had a good time,” Murray said. “The businesses had a good time — they enjoyed seeing the children going in and guiding them to where the (scavenger hunt items) were.”

Schon said the Second Saturday event for February will be Valentine’s Day-themed, and will be geared to encouraging people to buy gifts downtown.