You can believe the references the Wikipedia article is based off, such as BBC Scotland:

"They surveyed hundreds of fish and chip shops in Scotland to find out if "the delicacy" was available and if people were actually buying them. It found 66 shops which sold them, 22% of those who answered the survey. [...] Annie Anderson, from the Centre for Public Health Nutrition Research at the University of Dundee, used to send her medical students out into the city to see if they could find somewhere that sold deep-fried Mars bar. "It was not much of a challenge in Dundee," she says."

> I actually live in Scotland. I have never seen anywhere that sells deep-fried Mars bars here

The link above literally has a picture of a shop in Aberdeenshire which sells deep-fried Mars and claims to have invented the delicacy.

Consider the possibility that your experience might not fully encompass the truth and you might not have seen the whole of Scotland. It's quite a large country.

I'm actually from Scotland and grew up in an area that laid claim to their invention - near Stonehaven - around the time they popped up.

They're basically a silly novelty equivalent to "deep fried butter" is in the USA but they definitely came from Scotland. I've never had one and know only a handful of people who did, I suspect they came about as a sort of pre-internet way to grab attention and go "viral"

They're not exactly a delicacy or something that we should be proud of, mind ...

I lived in Edinburgh for a while, and there were a number of establishments (typically fish and chip shops) which made them.

> you can't believe anything that's on Wikipedia

Anything

God, how ridiculously hyperbolic. But we're in the midst of a debate about the origins of a deep fried candy bar with strangers on HN and just supposed to believe that you live in Scotland and have seen every possible offering in every possible shop.

Sounds stupid to decry something that people can verify to some extent then proceed to offer information that nobody can verify, doesn't it? This tired drum of Wikipedia being able to be edited by any wad off the street needs to be laid to rest, especially now in an age where misinformation is insanely prevalent in our general media and trusted sources who get paid to spread it.

They’ve been a Scottish thing for at least 15 years! Source: I ate one in Edinburgh 15 years ago.

Scotland is the home of deep frying things that have no right to be deep fried. My English friends are alarmed when I tell them of the “half pizza and chips” we used to have for lunch. Half a deep fried pizza, that is.

I have seen quite a few chippys in Glasgow and Dundee, but it has always seemed to me like a thing for tourists

I'm born and raised in Scotland, we're keeping it.

I lived in Edinburgh a while back and there are multiple chippies where you can get one.