Ernest matthew mickler biolife

By Scott A. Grant

In the summer of 1986, an unusual book with a peculiar title was rocketing up the New York Times best seller list. The book was titled “White Trash Cooking,” and it was written by Ernest Matthew Mickler of Ponte Vedra.

Ernie Mickler was born in 1940 in a portion of Ponte Vedra known as Palm Valley.

Back in those days, Palm Valley was home to shotgun shacks and moonshine stills. It was old Florida. That is what Ernie wrote about.

Ernest matthew mickler biolife

It wasn’t so much the recipes; it was a look inside a culture that was already fading away.

Ernie was a storyteller. The South, he said, “is legend, on top of legend, on top of legend.” Harper Lee, author of “To Kill a Mockingbird” called the book “a beautiful testament to a stubborn people.” Reading the book today is like stepping back in time.

Many were taken by the photographs. Harper Lee called them “shattering.”&n