Culinary Degradation, Part III - Deep Fried Horrors

by Bruce Watson, Posted Mar 3rd 2009 @ 11:30AM

A couple of months ago, I wrote a post in which I tried to touch bottom in the pantheon of disturbing cuisine. While I stopped short of nightmarishly horrifying food, like rotten cheese and duck embryos, I explored what I imagined were the worst fried foods imaginable.

In retrospect, I was incredibly naive.

At the end of the post, I asked my readers to submit their own choices for worst possible food, promising to do a little more research and write longer pieces about them. I got a fair bit of responses, which led to a fun post about beer floats. However, Guinness and vanilla ice cream only represented the tip of the iceberg, so to speak, and it seemed inevitable that I would return to further explore the wonders that make up the culinary wasteland.

Many of my readers shared tales about their favorite fried food joints. Museum Mouse, for example, turned me on to the joys of Scottish fried cuisine. Having had my fair share of haggis and cock-a-leekie soup, I thought that I had experienced everything that Scotland had to offer. I was wrong. For example, one popular treat is the Stonner, which is basically a sausage wrapped in gyro meat, battered, and deep fried. In Scotland, "stonner" is a euphemism for an erection, which seems ironic, given that coronary occlusions can lead to impotence. Still, I guess we all find our excitement in different places...

Another Scottish treat, deep fried pizza, seems surprisingly obvious; in fact, as an American, I'm a little disappointed that my country didn't come up with it first. After all, we're the geniuses who first dropped Oreos, ravioli, and Twinkies in a fryer; why didn't anybody throw in a pizza?

Another reader, Astin, pointed out that Dangerous Dan's, a Toronto restaurant, offers what must be the most impressive deep-fried dessert in the world. The Beast, which includes a deep fried Mars bar, 6 deep fried cheesecake triangles, 6 deep fried brownie squares, 2 scoops of vanilla whipped cream, 2 scoops of chocolate syrup, and 2 scoops of chocolate chips, costs a mere $14.44, defibrillation not included. The restaurant particularly recommends the dish for "medicinal cannabis users."

While I mentally digest the image of a few thousand calories worth of fat, sugar, and refined white flour, I'm going to also ask myself one last question: has Dangerous Dan's approached Michael Phelps yet? I hear he's in the market for some endorsements...

Filed Under: Food Oddities, Guilty Pleasures, Ingredients, Chefs & Restaurants, Restaurants
Tags: america, british isles, comfort food, deep fried, DeepFried, europe, Fried desserts, Fried Pizza, fried sausage, FriedDesserts, FriedPizza, FriedSausage, guilty pleasures, oddities, stonner

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Reader comments (Page 1 of 1)

3-03-2009 @12:03PM John said... Surely you haven't missed Soctland's deep fried Mars Bar? I believe you call them Milky Ways where you are.

The Scottish are the kings of deep frying things, I'm a medical student in England and we got shown a map in first year of the distribution of CHD (coronary heart disease) in the British Isles, Scotland is through the roof.

Supposedly the nougat becomes very soft and the chocolate melts but it is all surrounded by a crispy light batter (that is normally used for cod in Fish and chips). I really want to try one but they're difficult to find in England.

http://www.ilike.org.uk/2007/10/what_does_a_deep_fried_mars_ba.html

That's a nice story about them, and a good pic too!

Mmm... fried food, my adipose tissue owes it's existance to this vice.
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3-03-2009 @12:08PM John said... Oh and deep fried cream (creme?) eggs (I recall you enjoy them from a Flurry post)

http://flickr.com/photos/shauna/423164357/

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