In Step with Lisa Dupar: ‘From Southern Accents to Catering and Pomegranate Bistro: A Chef's Journey in Redmond’

By Richard Hao, Youth Director At Large

Edited by Laura Lee Bennett, Executive Vice President

Lisa Dupar and Assistant Alisha Brown. Photo: Patsy Rosenbach

On March 14th, the Redmond Historical Society welcomed Lisa Dupar, cookbook author, chef, and owner of Lisa Dupar Catering and Pomegranate Bistro in Redmond, WA. Lisa’s culinary and entrepreneurial journey in Redmond began in 1984 with the opening of Southern Accents, where she brought the flavors and hospitality of her Southern heritage to the community. The restaurant quickly developed a devoted following and expanded into event catering.

As her family and business grew, Lisa shifted her focus to Lisa Dupar Catering, and in 2005 opened Pomegranate Bistro—a welcoming “culinary playground” where friends gather over Southern-inspired dishes and Pacific Northwest fare. Her work reflects a lifelong commitment to hospitality, community, and creating experiences that bring people together.

We caught up with Lisa  for a bit of Q&A.

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RHS: What drew you into cooking and the food industry in the first place?

Southern Accents, 1984, Redmond, WA

Lisa Dupar: I got into cooking very early. I was raised in Atlanta by my mom, who was a single parent, and we made a deal: if I cooked, she would clean. That sounded perfect to me. I could make a mess and not get in trouble. From then on, food became my space.

I also spent a lot of time with family in Charleston, South Carolina. My aunt was raising six kids on her own, and food was at the center of everything there too. We cooked crab, shrimp, and fish, and one of my cousins even started a garden when he was young, so we had fresh tomatoes and watermelon. Looking back, food was always where we felt creative, useful, and connected.

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"Looking back, food was always where we felt creative, useful, and connected."

-Lisa Dupar

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My mom also took me to a lot of different restaurants, so I was exposed to many kinds of food growing up. Later, in high school, my boyfriend’s mother, who was from Italy, taught me cake decorating and showed me homemade pasta. That opened up a whole new world for me. I started to imagine a future in food, even though at the time becoming a chef was not something many young women talked about. I went to cooking school in Atlanta while I was still in high school, and from there I just kept going.

Memorabilia from Southern Accents, Lisa’s first restaurant. Photo: Cheryl Magnuson

RHS: You have a lot of dishes that feel distinctive and personal. How do you balance creativity with consistency at restaurant scale while still making everything your own?

Lisa Dupar: That is one of the central challenges of running a restaurant. For me, food is both craft and art. You want dishes to feel personal and creative, but they also have to work consistently in a professional kitchen.

I usually begin with dishes that mean something to me personally, especially food connected to my Southern roots. At the same time, I do not want the menu to be limited to one identity. I also bring in influences from my Hispanic background, and I love learning from the chefs and cooks I work with. When someone in the kitchen shares a family recipe or a dish from their culture, that can spark something really exciting.

So the balance comes from building dishes with strong flavor and real meaning, then making sure they can be executed well by the team over and over again. Creativity matters, but it has to live within a structure that makes the dish repeatable and dependable for guests.

RHS: Out of all the menu items at Pomegranate Bistro, which one represents you best, and why?

Lisa Dupar:  The dish that represents me best is probably the shrimp and grits. That one is very close to my heart because it connects directly to Charleston, South Carolina, where I spent so much time with my family.

The shrimp there are smaller than the giant prawns people often expect, but they have incredible flavor. And the grits I use come from a mill near Edisto Island, along the road to my grandparents’ place. That connection means a lot to me. It is not just a dish I like serving. It carries family memory, place, and a sense of home.

At first, we only served it at brunch, but the team felt strongly that it belonged on the menu full-time. I agreed. It is one of those dishes that really tells my story.

RHS: If you could add one more item to the current Pomegranate Bistro menu, what would it be?

Lisa Dupar: That is a hard question because it really depends on the season. In the height of summer, I would love to do something built around beautiful tomatoes and peaches, maybe a tomato-peach caprese. That feels fresh, bright, and very true to the way I think about warm-weather food.

In colder months, I tend to crave something more classic and comforting, like a braised lamb shank. I also love veal shanks, though veal has become less common because many people are hesitant about it. But I still love that style of cooking: slow-braised, rich, and deeply flavorful. So my answer probably changes with the time of year, but it would always be something seasonal and full of character.

Lisa brought copies of her cookbook, Fried Chicken & Champagne. Photo: Cheryl Magnuson

RHS: What’s your favorite food outside of the restaurant, just in general?

Lisa Dupar: This may sound simple, but I really love a beautiful steak. For whatever reason, it is something I genuinely crave. My favorite cuts are the ones with good marbling, like a ribeye or a New York strip.

What I love most is the fat, because that is where so much of the flavor lives. When it melts as the steak cooks, it creates that richness and depth that makes a great steak so satisfying. That is why highly marbled beef, even something like Wagyu, can be so special. Once you taste it, you understand immediately what all that marbling brings to the experience.