03/16/2026
We have come to a decision to permanently close this location.
We appreciated your patronage and support to our small mom and pop shop Pakistani Halal food restaurant in Clinton, NJ.
We bid you farewell as Village Dhaba.
It was an amazing 3 months to be able to serve the community food that we enjoy at home.
We hope to have the opportunity again to serve Village Dhaba food to the public one day.
I love Village Dhaba. We worked really hard to get the menu and recipes right before we opened in 2025 March. It took 2 years of planning and pricing and testing to get it to where it was. Although the ex*****on of the restaurant was not exactly as we had imagined, due to the political climate at that time it was harder to staff the restaurant properly.
I love this area. The people I have met throughout the years of being in this area, has given me more insight on how open minded people are and how the area patrons were starving for food that you have to drive minimally 40 minutes away to get a decent taste but a pricier tag.
With that all in mind, after a temporary closing, we had planned to reopen this year in 2026.
Now, the reality is. There is a lot of bureaucratic push back about the food that was being sold here. Halal Pakistani food.
A quick background of myself, Minji Ryu ( not mini rye , as the zoning officer of Clinton Township mentioned as a reply in my previous post). I grew up in Memphis,TN, Lexington KY and Seoul, Korea. Schooled in NYC and settled in NJ. My husband is from Pakistan. We are a Muslim family. It is rare in this area but there is a growing population. Why I share my background in a nutshell is, I’ve been through a lot of discrimination all my life. In every place I’ve lived and worked, but it was subtle and did not affect my livelihood.
BUT, unfortunately, I’ve felt it most in this area, and as we opened the Village Dhaba, and up to now, have felt it more than ever.
As per zoning ordinance changes our citations began because of the trucks we own from other leg of business, transportation. We stored a lot of restaurant equipment and produce needed for the restaurant in the refrigerated trailers, but that was the beginning of the citations.
The history of this property, it was called the “Old Milkhouse” . The use of the property as a food service/convenience store was grandfathered in, and originally the store was permitted with seating.
We were not permitted to have seating in our facility, and during the time we were temporarily closed beginning 2025 June, we started getting tickets of “parked in non designated parking” tickets, which have accrued to over 30 tickets.
The township revoked our tenancy and said they will not allow the grandfathering of the original use any further. They accused us of abandoning the property, which was not true, I was just not available for several months , as I was overseas on business.
The outcome of the citations and revocation of the tenancy and grandfathering of food service was a tremendous shock to us, and a huge financial loss as well.
As we had originally planned to reopen this year, we had to stop all improvements in operations and deal with the situation at hand.
This is where the background of knowing seeing and feeling discrimination comes in. I do not believe that this is an accident. I feel our establishment has been targeted as a minority owning a small business to push us out and close doors permanently.
I am not sure as to how many of our patrons have seen the last google review which was left by “G”. A shoutout for the patrons who called him/her/them out on the review. But this showed me that we are DEFINITELY being targeted.
We opened the business to serve the general public authentic, tasty, homestyle cooking at an affordable price. I believe Village Dhaba accomplished that in a very short time frame, and I DO apologize for having to close for so long.
Growing up, Korean food was not main stream, and now it is so popular I am at awe. Living as a mixed family, Pakistani food is also not well known. Indian food is. The biggest difference I would say between Indian restaurants and our restaurant was that we sold beef. Beef dishes are staple in many cultures and countries, and Pakistan is also one of them, and I was really excited that so many locals enjoyed the few beef dishes we DID serve.
Thank you again.
