Hardee’s manager wins company baking challenge

There are ordinary biscuits, and there are extraordinary biscuits.

Elaine Koch, general manager of Hardee’s Houston store, can apparently produce the latter version, because she won the 2015 Hardee’s Midwest Biscuit Baker Challenge. The competition pitted store managers and “biscuit specialists” from about 120 stores representing three Hardee’s Midwest franchises: TriStar Ventures LLC (with stores in Illinois, Iowa and Missouri), Heartland Restaurants LLC (of Kansas and Missouri) and Bighorn Restaurants LLC (of Montana and Wyoming).

To earn the honor, Koch had to advance through district and regional rounds in Eldon during January and February, and then survive an intense final round March 26 in the “top secret test kitchen” inside the Hardee’s Food Services Inc. main corporate offices in St. Louis. Significant loot was on the line in the finals, which featured a field of the top GMs and biscuit specialists from each franchise.

When the flour stopped flying, the rolling pins were put up and the top-secret ovens were powered down, the judges crowned the Heartland duo of Koch and biscuit specialist Laura Aguilar (of Kansas City, Kan.) winners. For the victory, Koch garnered the GM first-prize of $10,000 worth of biscuit-related equipment for her store, the event’s prestigious traveling trophy (with her name engraved on it) and $1,000 cash, while Aguilar was presented a trophy and also pocketed a grand.

“It was crazy,” Koch said. “It was stressful, but it was really fun.”

Winning came down in large part to mastering “biscuit science.” Koch said advancing through the district even required knowing biscuit math.

“We had to take three written tests,” she said. “We had to know the diameter, height, weight and other things.”

The finals required producing biscuits in a mere 15 minutes while being scrutinized by judges following a stringent scoring system.

“You had to have everything set up just right – the racks in the ovens, the temperature, everything,” Koch said. “Once you started, you had to mix the biscuits, roll them out, cut them and cook them. We had to make a whole batch, which is three pans. As soon as you had your third pan in, your time stopped. Then you could pick your best pan to be judged.”

Koch attributed her success in the final to overcoming a specific obstacle.

“The height was the hard part for me and I kept wondering what I was doing wrong,” she said. “I watched my biscuit maker and I asked what he was doing different. It was the way he was mixing his dough.”

Koch said the cash was nice, but the kitchen gear was a huge boost for the Houston operation.

“The ovens have been in there since we opened 23 years ago,” she said. “And I didn’t know about the money because they originally told us it was more for bragging rights, then they gave me $1,000 and I was like, ‘sweet!’

“But it was so much fun – and my team was very excited.”

While the Biscuit Baking Challenge has been around for a while, this is the first year the winner has earned the big-time equipment package. The traveling trophy will remain on display in Hardee’s Houston location until at least next spring when a champion is crowned again.

Koch said she plans to try to get it back.

“I’ve already told them I’ll be back,” she said. “They do this to put emphasis back on biscuits because that’s what makes our breakfast and if you do them correctly, you end up with a great product. If the managers are watching what they do, then they can make sure their biscuit makers are doing the right thing.

“And it just builds a great team spirit. I’m really looking forward to doing it again.”