Mr. Strahm, a self-taught private chef, attributes the basics of good cooking to his Grandmother and his technique to Julia Child & Jacques Pepin. “My classroom was PBS and my instructors were Julia Child and Jacque Pepin. I would consider myself a home schooled Julia Child and Jacques Pepin trained cook," quips Strahm.
As a teenager, Strahm discovered his talent for enhancing traditional family recipes and began experimenting with ingredients and foods. He recalls that “one dreary Saturday in February 1963 I was watching my usual Saturday morning cartoons. As I was changing channels I came across this tall rather awkward looking woman with a peculiar voice. She was preparing something called "Boeuf Bourguignon. That woman was Julia Child and the program was called The French Chef. I didn’t find out till many years later that it was the very first episode. That was the beginning of my lifelong passion with food and how to prepare it. It opened a door to an education of food, technique, and gastronomy that changed my life.”
His cooking career started as a breakfast cook in 1968. He quips that the lady that hired him, whose name was Ethel, showed him how to crack two eggs at a time on a griddle while balancing a cigarette with a one inch ash in her mouth. He laughs,“I actually learned to crack a dozen eggs on a griddle in less than 30 seconds…but without the cigarette.” He has worked in restaurants in New York, Washington D.C., and Palm Beach. He started a very successful catering business called Cinderfella’s in New York. While working in New York he was placed in charge of cooking for the Executive Training Program for NYU.
Since 2003, Mr. Strahm has taught cooking classes at the Museums of Oglebay Institute in Wheeling, WV as a fund raising event. Other organizations include the Brandeis National Committee, Stuart, Florida Chapter, The Lanier Mansion Museum in Madison, IN and the Fredericksburg Museum and Cultural Center in Fredericksburg, VA. Mr. Strahm has conducted cooking classes at William Sonoma in Palm Beach Gardens, FL, plus a number of classes in private golf communities in South Florida.
In addition to cooking and teaching, Mr. Strahm, together with his husband, Tim Luke of HGTV's Cash In The Attic, run a successful appraisal and auction business. They are known as "The Appraisal Guys…The Fric and Frac of Knick and Knack". By utilizing their combined knowledge of appraising and cooking they travel the country fundraising for not- for-profit organizations by combining appraisals with interactive cooking classes, as well as interactive dinners, earning Greg the nickname, "The Cooking Appraiser”. He has been a proud member of the USPCA, The United States Personal Chef’s Association.
Culinary Fund Raising events range from cooking demonstrations, performance brunches, wine tastings, intimate cocktail events up to private five course sit down interactive wine dinners.