Stereotypes are evil things. Once the Scots realized that as far as the rest of Europe was concerned their idea of a varied diet was two different colors on the plate, they kind of defiantly ran with it. Suddenly chip shops, which had been happily battering and frying haggis and black pudding (and sausages, mushy pea fritters, spam, fish, fishcakes) for years, were doing likewise with anything at all. The first and most notorious was the deep fried Mars bar, but it was soon followed by ice-cream, pizza, shoe leather, books, whisky, shortbread, the concept of fear and beards.