The East Bay’s Most Famous Indian Barbecue Spot Has Closed

For the past four years, Wah Jee Wah has tantalized street food lovers with its open-fire, charcoal-grilled Indian barbecue — a rarity in the Bay Area. On busy summer nights, crowds would line up outside the low-slung Hayward restaurant as chef-owner Ron Dumra and his team grilled yogurt-marinated chicken and sizzling lamb seekh kebabs over hot coals. Diners devoured the skewers in a haze of smoke at the picnic tables outside.

For now, Wah Jee Wah fans will have to travel elsewhere to get their Indian barbecue fix: The Hayward restaurant closed earlier this month after the landlord nearly tripled the rent. Now Dumra is looking to relocate the restaurant, and he says he already has tentative plans in place to open a smaller, takeout-oriented kitchen in Milpitas, a regular pop-up in Fremont