Possibly more terrifying than a meteor collision in the north of Scotland, is news that the nation's favourite bakery is downsizing, (sort of).

Laments were heard across the country after Gregg's announced its Edinburgh bakery was set for closure, enabling the company to invest more in selling food on the go.

Sandwiches, pastries and sweet treats from the Newcastle-based firm have become something of a staple in Scotland's culinary zeitgeist since they arrived on our doorsteps in the 1970s.

Which begs the question, why are they so popular?

If you're looking for lunch on a budget, it's difficult to ignore the allure of the steak bake when high streets are saturated with the blue-fronted eateries.

There are currently 1700 Greggs outlets across the UK with upwards of 50 in Glasgow and the surrounding area alone.

The rise of the high street baker started in the 1930s when founder John Gregg vowed to bring eggs and yeast to families in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne on his bicycle.

He opened his first shop in 1951 and by 1984, the growing company was on the London stock exchange.

Catering to regional palates is part of the Greggs mission statement - from pease pudding and stotties in the north east of England to Cornish pasties in the south.

But the baker has particularly excelled at some traditional Scottish dishes, including bridies, Scotch pies and square sausage.

In 2013 a man in Govanhill served seven days in prison after he was convicted of feeding a Greggs gammon roll to a police horse.

The man - who claimed the horse pinched his lunch as he was patting it - was warned by officers to stop trying to feed the horses the "meat-based product" because they were vegetarian.

Convinced he had done no wrong, Francis Kelly only realised he had been convicted after he read about it in a newspaper.

Due to a glitch in Google's algorithms, a rather offensive Greggs logo temporarily appeared on the search engine in 2014 reading "Greggs. Providing s* to scum for over 70 years".

Rather than throwing a flaky, the baker's PR team politely asked Google for a fix and offered up some fresh doughnuts to sweeten the deal.

Google, very graciously, accepted.

It's perhaps no surprise the pastry giant wanted to jump on the cafe culture band wagon, but eyebrows were most definitely raised when the Govan branch introduced outdoor seating.

But us hardy Scots have chosen to embrace the challenge - even Buzzfeed's Nina Glenross ventured outdoors when she ate at Greggs for a whole week.

She helpfully writes: "Only a handful of Greggs have indoor seating, which makes me sad. At the risk of stating the obvious, SCOTLAND IS COLD, WET, AND/OR WINDY at least 90% of the time. Sort it out, Greggs."

In 2015, Southpaw star Jake Gyllenhaal revealed that while in London, there's nothing he enjoys more than to sit on the grass and enjoy a Greggs baguette.

While promoting his new film in the UK, Gyllenhall told Magic FM he loves to pop into the high street bakers - that was after he spent eight months doing 2000 press ups a day to train for his role as boxing champion Billy "The Great" Hope.

And he's not the only celeb with a connection to the pastie purveyor - that same year Cheryl Fernandez-Versini teamed up with Greggs to launch her own chocolate bar.

Greggs are known for catering to changing appetites - recently they announced more customers are opting for healthier soups and salads over the lowly sausage roll.

And after a plummet in sales, the baker announced plans to axe the macaroni pie for the Scottish menu last year.

Riots were had in the streets (not true), pie-shaped effigies were burned at Holyrood (no) and the First Minister even backed a petition to keep the macaroni pie in production (that did happen).

Despite much protestation, and almost 2000 petition signatures, Scotland had to bid farewell to the lukwarm pasta dish.