Following a monthslong absence, one of the Bay Area’s masters of a seldom-seen Indian barbecue style is about to make a comeback.
Wah Jee Wah, No. 19 on the Chronicle’s 2025 Top Bay Area restaurants list, will reopen on Friday at a new location at 418 S. Main St. in Milpitas. Chef-owner Ron Dumra, who closed his original restaurant in Hayward last summer due to a reported rent increase, will resume grilling succulent meats and vegetables over charcoal in the tradition of the roaming street food carts commonly found in India and the Middle East.
The new location will open with dinner only to start, the menu still focused on grilled skewer plates, such as aromatic lamb seek kebab, yogurt-marinated chicken thighs or spiced mushrooms, served with rice and naan. They are all cooked outdoors over live coals, which “gives his barbecue an invisible smoky jacket imbued with the taste of gentle fire,” associate restaurant critic Cesar Hernandez wrote in a 2022 review of Wah Jee Wah…