Founder Spotlight: Emil Nordin of Zuca
Meet Emil Nordin
Cider makers and juice processors pay to have the pulp left over from pressing apples hauled away, according to Cornell food scientists. Zuca founder Emil Nordin would rather sell you the fiber. Turning leftover fruit pulp into high-fiber snacks made Zuca one of eight finalists in the Stanford Center on Longevity's 2026 Design Challenge, which drew roughly 250 submissions from more than 30 countries.
Company:
Zuca
Zuca is building out a new supply chain based around upcycling. On the consumer side, Zuca turns the apple pulp left behind after fruit processing into high-fiber snack bites with 16g of fiber per serving.
Location:
San Francisco, CA
When did you launch the business?
March 2025
Startup Stage?
Pre-seed
How did this business start?
I ordered a juice at Joe & The Juice just off Stanford's campus and watched the staff throw the fruit pulp into trash bags. I biked back at closing to ask for it, started prototyping in my dorm kitchen that night, and won a class pitch competition with it a few days later. Producers throw away the most nutrient-dense part of the fruit, sell you the sugar, and pay to get rid of the fiber. Zuca turns that overlooked resource into a supply chain whose value reaches far beyond the snack aisle.
What's one thing you're proudest of so far?
I've turned down multiple opportunities that promised faster payoffs to keep building what I believe in. My parents taught me and my siblings to lead with passion; Zuca is me doing that.
What's been the most surprising or challenging part of building this business?
How challenging fruit pulp is to work with. Getting it to hold its shape, stay shelf-stable without refrigeration, and keep its flavor and texture took far more iterations than the recipe itself. My training in bioengineering and in professional kitchens turned out to be the right pair: one let me approach formulation from a biochemical angle, the other kept the product grounded in how it tastes.
What do you bring to this community, and what are you hoping to find?
I bring a working model for turning a processor's waste stream into an ingredient and a revenue line, plus hard-won lessons from forming and packing a no-bake snack. I'm currently looking for retail and distribution contacts, investors, and founders who are ahead of me in CPG.
What's something people would be surprised to learn about you?
I trained as a chef in a Michelin-starred kitchen in Oslo from age 14. By 17, I had won a national cooking competition watched by 10% of Norway and been named Norway's most promising young chef. Then I walked away from that path to design my own major in Bioengineering & Food Systems Design at Stanford. In short, I'm a chef turned bioengineer turned entrepreneur.
Anything else you'd like to share?
If you're interested in distributing Zuca, investing, or getting involved in another way, I'd like to hear from you. The same goes the other way: if I can help you or your business with anything, please reach out.
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