VERY INTERESTING: DEEP FRIED MARS

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Battered deep fried Mars bars: everything you need to know

We've got a lot to thank Scotland for, and top of the list has got to be deep fried Mars bars

The Scots have always been great inventors, their very own John Logie Baird came up with the television we know and love today, while good old Alexander Bell was one of Alba’s own too – who is credited with inventing the telephone. These practical, modern devices however have nothing on their culinary imagination: Scotland has undoubtedly gifted us with the weirdest and most wonderful combinations of foodstuffs the world has ever seen.  

Sure, there’s haggis (made from all sorts of guts, literally, and gore), there’s Irn Bru which famously stains so irrevocably that even the strongest chemicals won’t remove it from your sofa, and of course there’s the tottie scone, a genius use for leftover mashed potato which is particularly good when toasted and spread thickly with butter. 

Whatever the merits of the aforementioned foodstuffs, nothing comes close to the battered Mar bar, when it comes to Scotland’s genius. And don’t they just inspire a whole lot of questions? What are they, who invented them, do they actually cause death, and so on and so forth on that jolly trajectory. To put all of our minds at ease we’ve answered the most Googled questions about battered Mars bars below. We’ve even included a recipe, and where to buy them in Edinburgh. You. Are. Welcome.

What is a deep fried Mars bar?

An existential question, certainly, but if we had to put our finger on it, a battered Mars bar is two things. A Mars bar and batter. It might come as a surprise that it is literally that simple, but then life is full of surprises is it not. In many a Scottish fish and chip shop you’ll find that they’ll fairly obligingly dunk you a Mars bar from their back shelf into a vat of batter, yes the very same one they dip the fish in, and chuck it in the fryer, only for it to emerge a couple of moments later crisp and golden. The only question remaining to be answered is, do you put salt and vinegar on it? We aren’t sure they’re a sensible food pairing, but we’ve seen the combination with our own eyes.

Deep fried mars bar calories: what's the damage?

It’s quite crude to talk about such things as numbers when lusting over a deep fried Mars bar, but you asked the question so here we are tasked with answering it. It has long been touted that one of these beauties will come in at a scorching 1200 calories, but according to the Scotsman the calories in a battered mars bar actually tot up to somewhere between 600-900 calories, which if you think about it isn’t too bad. If we go with the lower end of the scale you can have around four and be done with your daily intake. Although we’re not sure it would tick all your other nutritional boxes. If you’re concerned about your diet we advise you speak to a professional and certainly don't follow the advice above.

How bad for you is a deep fried mars bar, really?

How long is a piece of string, you know? How bad battered Mars bars are for you is a tricky question but we’d be willing to stake our life on a wager that they’re not great for you. Aside from the calorie count potentially nearing the 1000 mark, they are thought to additionally contain up to 25% of your daily fat allowance, as well as harbour many an ‘anti-nutrients’, like sugar, glucose syrup and vegetable fat. It’s not looking like great news if you were hoping to make them a regular feature of your diet, but everything in moderation.

Supposedly Mars have publically distanced themselves from the idea of deep-frying, announcing that they do not condone the chip-shop-sport of covering their precious product in thick batter. Seems a bit rude. According to an article in the Daily Mail they sent a note to the inventors of this glorious snack asking them to stop attaching the chocolate company’s  brand to their invention. Evie Kyriakides, senior regional trademark counsel for Mars Europe, wrote: ‘We are concerned that the use and reference to our Mars brand and products may mislead the public into thinking that your products are in some way associated with, or endorsed by, Mars, when this is not in fact the case.’ 

And it would appear that Mars consider their product ‘healthy’, as Evie added, Mars have a 'marketing code, through which we promote a healthy, active lifestyle to consumers. We have recently reduced the saturated fat level in our Mars Bar recipe. Deep-frying our Mars Bar product, of course, counters this significantly.' Well, there you go then, it's the batter that's the problem here. 

Who invented the deep fried Mars bar?

If we’re all sitting comfortably we can begin on our brief history of the battered Mars bar. With his very own Wikipedia listing no less, John Davie is thought to have invented this Scottish treat in his Northern chippy, the Haven Chip Bar (which is now called the Carron if you’re on the hunt for it). Sitting pretty in the seaside town of Stonehaven, which is near Aberdeen, John’s chippy is thought to have started serving these delights in 1992 after a child popped in and asked for a Mars supper off the cuff (so they're the true genius here, turns out). 

That’s 27 glorious years we’ve been blessed with John’s invention, and for that we’ll be forever grateful. In the same Wikipedia listing, which we’ve used for much of this section’s research, they claim that the Carron chipshop say they sell 100-150 Mars bars each and every week thanks to their reputation, and rather depressingly of all sales of deep fried Mars bars it is thought that 76% of them are sold to children.

And as always have a chilled day from the Viking