DURHAM, N.C. (March 30, 2012) – If you love eating breakfast biscuits baked at the Hardee’s® restaurant at 3921 N. Duke St. your taste buds are not being fooled. Biscuit maker Shirley Jones was named the 2012 Best Biscuit Maker of Boddie-Noell Enterprises, the largest Hardee’s franchise operator in the country. Jones advanced beyond over 800 other biscuit makers at 335 restaurants to win the overall award.
Jones also earned the title of Best Biscuit Maker in 2009.
Contestants in Boddie-Noell’s annual Biscuit Maker Challenge represented Hardee’s locations across North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and Kentucky. In addition to Jones, the three best biscuit maker regional winners were Jeanette Thomas of Aberdeen, Leziel Sanders of Petersburg, Va. and Elaine Hall of Pennington Gap, Va.
“It feels great to win again,” said Jones. “I’ve worked hard to perfect the procedures and improve daily.”
Boddie-Noell honored the four regional winners and announced Jones as the overall winner during a banquet at the company’s Rose Hill Plantation near Nashville.
The competition started in December, and each biscuit maker was evaluated based on knowledge of proper biscuit equipment, cleanliness and care of biscuit equipment, knowledge and execution of company procedures, grooming and appearance, and the quality of his or her biscuits. The competition’s judges included general and district managers, regional directors and vice presidents of operations and other executives in the restaurant division of Boddie-Noell.
Jones has worked as a biscuit maker at Hardee’s for 15 years.
“Consistency is the key to Shirley’s biscuits,” said David Oakes, a Boddie-Noell regional senior director. “She was standing up here in 2009 and here she is again.”
Jones says the key to creating the best Hardee’s Made from Scratch™ Biscuit begins with “loving what you do.” Then she says “it takes practice and following the procedures.”
Jones also noted she has been baking biscuits her entire life.
“We have some great biscuit makers within our company and Shirley is always one of the best,” said Terry Lewis, Boddie-Noell’s vice president of operations for Hardee’s and host of the Biscuit Maker Banquet. “She makes great biscuits and always has a cinnamon raisin biscuit waiting on me when I visit her store.”
Aside from making biscuits, Jones enjoys singing in the choir at church and gardening with her husband. She is also an avid collector of shoes and jewelry who loves to cook. Hardee’s Made from Scratch™ biscuits, which have been served at Boddie-Noell restaurants since the 1970’s, are a beloved item on the restaurant’s menu.
In 2011, Hardee’s restaurants owned and operated by Boddie-Noell used 712,240 pounds of biscuit flour, 9,810,900 pounds of biscuit mix and 848,795 gallons of buttermilk to make the golden brown biscuits – enough flour, mix and buttermilk to fill over 454 tractor-trailers.
About Boddie-Noell Enterprises
Boddie-Noell Enterprises (BNE) is celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2012. BNE is the largest Hardee’s franchise operator in the United States with 334 restaurants across four states (North Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky and South Carolina). The company employs more than 12,000 people and is headquartered in Rocky Mount, N.C. For more information about the company, visit www.bneinc.com.
