Hannah Hopkins Wins 2nd Annual Battle of the Butts Competition Held at RCC
The culinary department at Robeson Community College hosted its 2nd Annual Battle of the Butts competition, allowing students to test their skills in barbeque sauces and pork rubs.
“The students were tasked with an opportunity to create a rub and a sauce for a fundraiser we are doing with Community in Schools,” said Chef Lester Locklear, director of hospitality programs at RCC. “We selected two students that we felt had the best rub and sauce. We will select the winner today and the winner will use their rub on the pulled pork and the winner of the sauce will have a 2 oz portion of the sauce to be served on the side.”
Judging the competition were Scott Lamm, dean of university transfer and health sciences; LaRonda Lowery, assistant vice president of instructional services; Patrick Jacques, dean of applied technology and public safety; Robin Blue, secretary for educational services; Loisteen DeFreece, representing Communities in Schools; and Dr. Danny Stedman, who serves on the RCC Board of Trustees.
“Today these individuals here are going to be the final taste testers. These guys are going to help us judge the final competition,” said Chef Lester.
The competition was close, but in the end, there was a clear winner.
Coming in first place was ‘Rub A’ and ‘Sauce A’ by Hannah Hopkins of Hope Mills.
“Hannah’s sauce is a Carolina Gold sauce, so it is a mustard-based sauce,” said Chef Lester.
“All of it was great,” said Stedman to the students competing in the competition. “I ate everything, everything was great, all of you did a great job.”
“We had some great students who took this challenge on and I think they did an outstanding job,” added Chef Lester, as everyone gave a round of applause to the students.
As for the winner of the competition, Hopkins says her inspiration came from wanting to change things up a bit.
“Growing up, I never liked Carolina vinegar-based sauce, but I’ve always liked the mustard flavor and honey mustard and I just wanted to do something that was different and not to be expected,” said Hopkins. “For the rub, really what inspired me was that I just went in my kitchen and looked at a whole bunch of spices and just started tasted it and whatever I liked I put it together.”
“I loved her sauce,” said Chef Linsie Locklear in speaking about Hopkins. “She is very meticulous and very detailed-oriented. We knew she would do great in this competition.”
Ironically, Hopkins says she almost didn’t enter the competition because she didn’t think she had a chance.
“It’s surreal,” said Hopkins. “I honestly, I can’t believe I did win. I’m thankful, I know the rest of them [the students] they all did a good job, and I’m proud of them as well.
Hopkins hadn’t always planned on majoring in culinary, but now she says it was the best decision she made.
“I always loved cooking but never really considered it as a career, but I said, why not just give it a shot? And since last fall semester, I have absolutely fallen in love with it.”
Hopkins says she is looking forward to her future in culinary and after completing her degree, she plans on pursuing two other degrees at Robeson Community College – one in baking and pastry arts and another in hospitality management.
