Do Scottish people really deep-fry Mars Bars?

The nation that gave us haggis has indeed deep-fried the Mars Bar:

"The Deep-fried Mars bar was born in the chip shops of Aberdeen and
the surrounding fishing towns, where people paradoxically rarely eat
fish (too good for you) and where absolutely everything is dipped in
batter and fried, including pizza. Mars bars, which in the UK are
actually like the American Milky Way, were the first to get the
treatment, but Snickers and other chocolate bars are now used too."

YumFood: Deep Fried Mars Bars
http://yumfood.net/recipes/deepfriedmars.html

"A Scottish chef has sparked a national debate in France after
outraging food purists by putting deep-fried chocolate bars on the
menu.

Ross Kendall introduced the 'delicacy' after joining the Parisian
restaurant Le Chipper when it opened last year.

His menu also features chocolate-filled ravioli and chicken in
Seven-Up but it was the popularity of the deep-fried Mars Bar with a
dash of cinnamon that got French food critics in a stew."

BBC News: French batter Mars bars menu 
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/654750.stm

"Scotland, it turns out, has the highest incidents of heart disease,
cancer, and strokes in the developed world. Much of that can probably
be traced to what has become, in the last decade, Scotland's de facto
national dish: the deep fried Mars bar. They seem to go for about a
pound forty.

The origins of the DFMB are cloudy and getting cloudier as the treat
grows in popularity on the continent. The BBC believes it originated
in north-eastern Scotland, possibly the Haven Chip Shop in Stonehaven
(a town near Aberdeen legendary for its chip shops). The Haven Chip
Shop has recently gone out of business."

The Conspiracy Primer: Deep Fried Mars Bar
http://www.geocities.com/conspiracyprime/e2_deepfriedmarsbar.htm

I must admit that, as a native Oklahoman, this does not seem at all
unusual to me. Very nearly anything can be deep-fried, and eventually
very nearly everything probably will be, by somebody. I have had
batter-fried bacon and deep-fried cheese, and once you've had those
delicacies, it's difficult to get excited about a Mars Bar.

Google search strategy:

Google Web Search: "mars bar" "deep fried"
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=%22mars+bar%22+deep+fried

Thanks for a tasty question!

Best wishes,
pinkfreud

A posting by Mike Reid in news:uk.food+drink.misc shows that deep
fried pizza is authentically Italian:

"Eating up Italy" Mathew Fort 
page 98  (Naples, Via Tribunali).
"three pizzerie e friggitorie (deep fried pizza)"

Pg104
"Further along, an old lady, a frittaruola, fished a calzone,
puffy and golden, with a long wrought iron skewer from the
surface of a tub of boiling oil in which it had been fried" 

There are also deep fried kebabs now available:

"The Stonner", a 1,000-calorie, deep fried pork sausage kebab has been
dubbed the most dangerous fast food in Britain. Sky News reported
Monday the kebab contains 46 grams of fat and is double the calories
of a Big Mac hamburger.
http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20040809-055045-1297r.htm

Deep fried Maltesers are apparently quite nice.

Owain

Local fairs in a place which shall remain nameless have been selling
not only deep fried candy bars, but also deep fried oreo cookies and
deep fried twinkies.  Basically, if it can be dipped in batter and
deep fried, someone has probably made money off selling it.

I've had a few deep fried mars bars when drunk, and they're great. 
But they are not as popular as some would have you believe. No-one
eats them as a staple or in the same way they eat other deep fried
things like pies and my personal favourite: the Cheese'n'burger (two
cheapo burger patties with a slice of chhese in the middle, battered
and fried: delicious and very, very, greasy). I think the deep fried
mars bar is just a way for scots and adopted scots like me to asert
how hard and different and quirky they think they are.

Also, from yesterday's Guardian: 

Nouvelle cuisine

Would you like last rites with that?
There's a new delicacy on the fast food market, and, like caviar and
oysters, it's an acquired taste. The question is how long you will
live after you have acquired it. Weighing in at 1,000 calories for a
double portion with chips, the stonner is a deep-fried sausage wrapped
in donner meat and garnished with a secret, spicy sauce. It made its
appearance a month ago, in Glasgow, and has been roundly denounced by
health experts ever since.

So, in the spirit of selfless enquiry, I nobble a companion and seek
out Ruby's Fish Bar in Old Dumbarton Road. Undeterred by the warning
notice - "We can only supply one Stonner per customer per week" - we
place our order.

Despite the adverse publicity - or because of it - business is
booming, says former taxi driver Campbell McArthur: "I'd be worried if
somebody walked out of here, took a bite and dropped dead. But what
are the chances of that happening?"

He and owner Sati Sangag are not short of ideas: "We're going to build
a stonner corner, where customers can learn about them," says
Campbell. "And we're trying to persuade the open-top buses to include
us on their tour. 'That's the art gallery. There's the Kelvin Hall.
This is Ruby's Fish Bar.' "

Soon the meals are ready - too soon. My companion and I find a park
bench, lift the lids on our polystyrene packs and examine the
contents.

"I've just remembered I'm a vegetarian," Sarah says. 

"No you're not. Eat." 

She lifts her stonner by one end and pops half an inch into her mouth.
"Aaargh!" she cries, clutching her chest and toppling sideways.

"Get up. You're not funny," I tell her, and try a bite of mine. 

It yields a strange mix of sensations - crunchy, juicy, fibrous,
yielding - the sweet, spicy sauce lightening and enhancing the savoury
notes of the meats. Sarah decides the batter is excessive and peels it
off like a banana skin. The stripped stonner looks exposed and
vulnerable.

As we munch contentedly in the sunshine, a group of girls from the
local school pass by, tucking into Ruby's deep-fried delights. Haven't
they learned in class that fast food damages their health? Don't they
know the benefits of fruit and salad?

"Salad?" replies a slim blonde. "Now that is nasty."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1295221,00.html