“Soul food with a twist,” is what Michael Boyd, owner of Boyd’s Southern Fish Fry, gives to each of his customers.

Boyd came out of retirement after 30 years of working for the government to open up his own fish fry. He hasn’t always had a love for cooking but he started to appreciate it more once he went to college and his mom and grandmother were no longer there.

Boyd said that people would tell him, “Hey, Michael you should do something with your cookin’.” He decided to create a fish fry in Jacksonville, Florida because he believed that people should get a real taste of Alabama-Mississippi catfish. “You can’t get a decent piece of fish here. Not catfish. You can’t get that…They had my catfish and they wouldn’t eat anything else.”

All of the food he creates is his original recipes that are inspired by his hometown. Some of his cooking (besides the catfish) are unique, they include a deep-fried hotdog, fried chicken wings, and a scrambled burger.

Boyd gave me some of his scramble burger which is slow cooked ground beef with coleslaw. The ground beef had the best amount of a smoky flavor and the sauce on top tied it all together.

Boyd has created something unique, “You don’t have too many fish fry trucks. You may have a seafood truck, but they got a lot of other seafood. Shrimp and stuff. I do have fried shrimp. But that was no southern fish fry.”

Being a food truck, people can walk up all the time and Boyd’s regulars have turned into some of his friends. One of his most important regulars is Patrick, “He’s retired and well. He has nothing to do so he’ll come to spend the day with me and eat. Eat twice. He comes when I first get out here at 11. He eats about 11:30 and he’s still here by about 4 o’clock.”

Boyd’s encouragement for anyone that loves cooking and is interested in starting a food truck is that “If that’s something you want to do, put your all into it. That’s how I was told I got it from the guy I bought it from. He told me if that’s what you really want to do because I mean, it’s not hard work is not easy work is just if you love what you do. You make it easy.”