‘A cultural event you can’t miss’: SU students eat pudding with forks, German style
Pudding mit Gabel began in Germany. Now, the trend has spread to American college campuses, like Northeastern University and as of Tuesday, Syracuse University. Lars Jendruschewitz | Senior Staff Photographer
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Elena Cooper hadn’t eaten pudding since elementary school. But, on Tuesday, she huddled up with some friends in front of Carnegie Library to eat chocolate Jell-O pudding — with a fork.
“I feel like we need more random stuff,” Cooper, a Syracuse University graduate student, said. “This is a way to hopefully get people together who have zero common interests.”
Pudding with a fork originated in Germany this year. The trend, Pudding mit Gabel in German, sprang up the same way in Europe as it did on SU’s campus: a few people deciding to make a poster or a social media post.
The phenomenon spread throughout Germany, with large groups gathering in public spaces to eat pudding with forks. Recently, it’s jumped the pond to the U.S. with events in Washington, D.C., and other big cities. The trend has popped up in the past few weeks at college campuses like Northeastern University.
The meaning behind the trend is simply that it doesn’t have any meaning, Fiona Grundmann, a German student studying abroad at SU, said. But, Grundmann said she realized events like these could bring people together and inspire more to join.
Grundmann is from Karlsruhe, the same city where the trend was born. When Cooper saw the trend on TikTok, she sent it to Grundmann, who was immediately on board with holding their own version of the event at SU. Grundmann then made a poster with an image of chocolate pudding that they displayed around campus. The poster described pudding with a fork as “a cultural event you can’t miss.”
Many SU students did miss it, partially because of Tuesday’s rainy weather, Cooper said. The two had planned to sit right in the middle of Shaw Quadrangle, but had to relocate to the covered area at the top of Carnegie’s steps.
For the around eight students who attended, the event was something to look forward to. Alex Calabrese, an SU senior, is half German, and practices his language skills by watching German-language TikToks. When he came across videos of other pudding with fork events, he said he was just waiting for someone to organize a Syracuse version.
“I was captivated by it,” Calabrese said. “This is amazing. So seeing it here is great.”
Though the poster instructed attendees to bring their own pudding, Cooper and Grundmann brought a pack to share. They’re considering planning another pudding with fork event in the future, maybe on a sunnier day.
“In our daily life, you just follow a ton of rules and do whatever we’re supposed to do,” Grundmann said. “It’s a thing that you’re not supposed to be doing, even though it’s for no reason.”
