Derek Merdinyan\\ Author + Entrepreneur

Derek and Erica talk about Side Hustles: making money while...

Sun, 01 Aug 2010 16:26:00 -0400

Derek and Erica talk about Side Hustles: making money while still in school.

Derek and Erica talk internships, Googling & anonymity on...

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 00:20:20 -0400

Derek and Erica talk internships, Googling & anonymity on World of Warcraft.

Original Recipe: Pan fried red snapper & bok choy steamed in sake w/ a garlic-sake-miso reduction.

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 01:45:42 -0400

I had some fun messing around in the kitchen tonight. The result: pan fried red snapper with bok choy steamed in sake covered with a garlic-sake-miso reduction.

Ingredients (for a single serving):

1 medium fillet of red snapper

2-3 heads of baby bok choy

2 cloves of garlic

3/4- 1 tbsp miso paste (depending on how salty it is)

1/3-1/2 cup of junmai sake

1/4 cup of milk

1/4 cup of flour

1.5 tbsp Peanut oil

.5 tbsp Sesame oil

Sea Salt

Sesame seeds (optional)

Bok Choy and Snapper should be cooked at the same time

Instruction: Bok Choy

Wash the bok choy and cut in half, lengthwise.

Chop up the garlic.

Heat up a saute pan on medium low heat and put in 3/4 tbsp peanut oil and 1/4 tbsp sesame oil.

Drop in half the chopped garlic and let it heat up for 30 seconds.

Add in the bok choy and toss to coat with oil.

Add in a pinch of salt, half the miso paste (1/2 tbsp) and the sake. Toss to coat and cover to steam.

Reduce heat to low, cover, and let steam. Toss every 2-3 minutes until the leaves have wilted slightly. The white part should still have some crunch. Finish with salt as needed. Don’t worry if the miso paste hasn’t dissolved, it will be incorporated into the miso reduction later.

Remove bok choy from pan and plate. Reserve as much liquid as possible in the pan (it will be used later to finish the sauce).

Instruction: Snapper

Pour the milk onto a plate.

Spread the flour on another plate and mix in 1/2 tbsp of sea salt.

Heat a teflon pan to medium heat with the remaining peanut oil and sesame oil.

Pat the snapper dry with a paper cloth and dredge in the milk before coating in the flour/salt mix.

Swirl the pan and add the snapper when the oil has heated through.

Flip the snapper when it is 2/3rds cooked through; there should be a beautiful golden brown on the presentation side (the side being cooked first).

When the other side of the snapper has cooked through, remove and place over the bok choy.

Instruction: Reduction Sauce

Quickly turn up the heat in the snapper-pan and add the remaining garlic and miso. Cook for 20-30 seconds being careful to not burn the garlic.

Add the sake-garlic-miso juices from the bok choy into the snapper-pan and continue to heat on a high temperature while dissolving all the miso into the liquid.

Reduce the sake-garlic-miso sauce until you only have a few tablespoons.

Taste the sauce before you ladle it over the crispy snapper and bok choy. Be cognizant that a little goes a long way; the reduction sauce may be very salty, depending on the brand of miso paste you used. If the reduction sauce is too salty, you can add another 1/4 cup of sake and reduce for a few more minutes.

Top with sesame seeds as necessary.

يبحث Confession 3.0

Wed, 07 Jul 2010 01:54:25 -0400

There are still a few more months before I’ll be diving in to update “Owning Y.O.U.” for the second edition printing. To fill the time I’ve decided to work on the third (and hopefully close-to-final) revision of the first book I ever wrote: “The Confession.”

I finished the first 235-page draft of the Confession almost four years ago. I’ve enjoyed polishing the story and think it’s time to finish this one off.

Unlike “Owning Y.O.U.” I won’t think I’ll be going the traditional paperback route…

SBTV Episode #24: Checkin from Week One of the Internship

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 19:41:30 -0400

SBTV Episode #24: Checkin from Week One of the Internship

SBTV Episode #23: Starting Internships Derek and Erica just...

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 19:40:18 -0400

SBTV Episode #23: Starting Internships

Derek and Erica just graduated from their respective colleges and both have started summer internships. In this episode, we talk about how we prepared for the first days of our internships.

SBTV Episode #22: Building and Maintaining New Connections

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 19:39:19 -0400

SBTV Episode #22: Building and Maintaining New Connections

On this week’s episode of Student Branding TV, Erica and...

Mon, 17 May 2010 16:39:17 -0400

On this week’s episode of Student Branding TV, Erica and Derek talk about maintaining the consistency of your personal brand both online and offline.

On this episode of SBTV Erica and I talk about building your...

Tue, 04 May 2010 17:40:51 -0400

On this episode of SBTV Erica and I talk about building your brand through networking.

Student Branding TV Episode #19 - Derek and Erica talk about the...

Tue, 20 Apr 2010 15:14:34 -0400

Student Branding TV Episode #19 - Derek and Erica talk about the offline aspects of building your personal brand.

Questions/Comments? Email us at StudentBrandingTV@gmail.com

Derek and Erica talk about building a blog to grow your personal...

Mon, 12 Apr 2010 13:49:07 -0400

Derek and Erica talk about building a blog to grow your personal brand.

Questions? Email us at StudentBrandingTV@Gmail.com

I shot a video over at Jobfully.com talking about how to start...

Wed, 07 Apr 2010 20:47:57 -0400

I shot a video over at Jobfully.com talking about how to start building their personal brand. Looking forward to working with them more after their service launches.

Good News: Owning Y.O.U. is in the iPad’s Bookstore. Bad...

Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:06:31 -0400

Good News: Owning Y.O.U. is in the iPad’s Bookstore.

Bad News: It is suffering from severe formatting issues. Working w/ publisher to get these fixed ASAP.

Happy to share that I’m now co-hosting StudentBranding TV...

Mon, 05 Apr 2010 14:11:48 -0400

Happy to share that I’m now co-hosting StudentBranding TV with @EricaZucco

In our pilot episode, we give a solid overview of what personal branding is.

We would love to get your feedback to help make the program better.

I Love Amazon Fresh, But This is a Problem

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 09:30:00 -0400

It’s true, I do ♥ Amazon Fresh. I love getting my groceries delivered to my house for free (albeit with a high minimum purchase). The prices are comparable to what you find in the grocery stores, and in my experience, the produce is even better. To top it all off, they even gave me this free bumper sticker with my latest order.

My latest order. Looks like a lot of food, right?

Exhibit A:

Inside one of these crates, we find a standard cooler-style bag.

Inside this bag, we find a green plastic bag and a reusable ice pack…

Inside the green bag, we find another bag; I’m reminded of a set of Russian nesting dolls.

Yes, you are seeing correctly. That is a head of garlic. Just a single head of garlic.

Let’s recap, shall we?

1). Large Green Crate
2). Cooler Bag
3). Green Bag
4). Clear Bag
5). Garlic

All this was used to deliver a single head of garlic to my home.

To quote the late Billy Mays, “But wait, there’s more!” One final kicker.

Was there no room to put the garlic in here?*

*It is possible there are some procedures that need to be followed where fresh ingredients must be delivered with a cooler pack. Two of the other containers also contained cooler packs with room to spare. One of them had some raw pork (perhaps they can’t mix raw meat with anything else). That said, the other cooler bag contained tofu - definitely not a dangerous raw ingredient.

Trailer for my upcoming film project: “Status Update:...

Sat, 20 Mar 2010 02:57:02 -0400

Trailer for my upcoming film project: “Status Update: Business is Social”

Looking for a simple and elegant way to aggregate your personal...

Sun, 14 Mar 2010 16:22:50 -0400

Looking for a simple and elegant way to aggregate your personal brand onto one site? Check out Flavors.me.

Facebook Closes Page for Unemployed Seeking Help

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 13:01:00 -0500

About a year ago I started a Facebook Fan page called “Damn, I need a Job!” (DINAJ) which I used to connect my friends with job opportunities from other people in my network. I never intended on growing the group, I just wanted a place to share opportunities and help people I cared about. For the longest time, the group never had more than 70-80 fans.

A few days into February, I noticed a sudden jump in the fan base: 20 new fans; a sizable jump but nothing to write home about. A week later, the group was nearly 1,000 people strong and I got to thinking that DINAJ could become a resource for more than job opportunities, but job seeking, interviewing, and personal branding tips as well.

Two weeks later, the group had surpassed 100k fans.

Over these few weeks I enjoyed engaging with the fans of this community and spent a good deal of time thinking about the best way to make this a great employment resource.

The deathnote arrived from Facebook, February 24th.

My guess is Facebook classifies DINAJ as a fan page that ‘represents generic concepts’. It’s the only thing that makes sense. While the page is still live, my ability to publish new content to the page has been revoked. This isn’t a pity story for me, but rather for the individuals seeking employment help.

I’m just sorry I couldn’t contribute more.

Coming soon...

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 13:04:00 -0500

First Look: Square Mobile Payment System

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 21:39:43 -0500

First Look: Square Mobile Payment System