Live crab & fresh seafood
The tank is the first stop for many shoppers — live crab and a helpful seafood counter that regulars swear by for weekend family meals.
From the tank
The story behind the sign
What does “Dong A” mean?
東亞
“East Asia” — not a person’s name, a promise.
The full line across the top of the sign, 東亞食品公司, reads “East Asia Food Company.” The name told Orlando’s Asian families exactly what they’d find inside: the whole region, on the shelves.
It started with a family looking for the taste of home. The Chau family escaped Vietnam and arrived in Orlando in 1979, when the city’s Asian community was small and its ingredients were nearly impossible to find.
After working two jobs, the family’s father opened the store in 1982 — Dong A — or “East Asia” — Market, as Central Florida Public Media reported it — first on Orange Avenue, and later on Mills Avenue, where it still stands.
The neighborhood grew up around it. Mills 50 — Orlando’s Little Saigon — filled in with restaurants, cafés, and shops, and Dong-A became one of its anchors: Orlando’s oldest Asian market, open every day for more than forty years.
Today the founder’s children run the store his way — shelves deep with Vietnamese staples, Chinese, Korean, Thai, and Japanese groceries, and staff who will happily tell you how to use an ingredient you’ve never seen before.
People drive an hour for it — regulars call it a treasure.