Asian Square Lost Its Grocery Anchor Years Ago. Its Restaurants Became the Anchor Instead.
October 8, 2026
October 8, 2026
"I hope the World Cup event going to remind people around this area, we still here," Steven Truong told Atlanta Magazine in June. "Buford Highway is still here."
Truong and his wife, Ngoc Le, have owned Paris Banh Mi in Asian Square since June 2024. They opened it after years of running a nail salon. Since then he has watched three pounds of coffee go from $12 to $25, and he now works seven days a week to keep the shop open. That's a hard year by any measure. In the same months, the shopping center at 5150 Buford Highway NE in Doraville saw one of its best-known restaurants nearly double its room and a brand-new Malaysian café open its doors. In October, a national food show puts Asian Square on television.
These stories fit together. Asian Square doesn't run like a typical strip center with one owner and a big store that pulls in traffic. For years its restaurants have been the reason people pull in, and the 2026 changes show tenants betting on that by growing inside the center.
Asian Square went up in 1992. Rough Draft Atlanta reported in 2024 that the property is held by the Asian Square Condominium Association: 30 separately owned units overseen by a board, not a single developer or investment firm. Doraville Mayor Joseph Geierman said that split ownership made it hard for the owners to agree on a plan for big repairs.
The biggest unit belonged to the anchor Asian grocery store. At a December 2022 Doraville City Council meeting, board member Derek Wu said that space had been empty for several years. It's by far the largest unit by square footage, and its owner was behind on the special assessments that pay for shared work. Then the parking lot and drainage rebuild, permitted in 2021, ran into eroded pipes and rising costs. The council voted unanimously to excuse the center from a $31,950 tree bank payment. Wu put it plainly: "I also don't think the city wants a dead shopping center."
In spring 2024 the construction cut hard into business. A La Mei Zi employee estimated the Taiwanese restaurant, open daily since 2015, was losing $1,000 every Friday, Saturday and Sunday because customers thought it had closed. A worker at the Phúc Lộc Thọ gift shop put that shop's loss at 70% of its business since construction began. The latest city status we found is from March 2024, and it described the renovation as still underway. We couldn't find any newer public update on whether the work is done.
That's the backdrop for 2026. A center with an empty anchor and a long repair fight had nothing pulling customers in except its restaurants.
In 2024, with construction finished on her side of the lot, Kamayan ATL owner Mia Orino told Rough Draft that visitors kept asking her whether La Mei Zi had closed. "We want people to know [businesses are] still open, even during construction," she said. "We hate to see them suffer." One restaurant owner was speaking up for the restaurant across the lot. That's how a center works when its restaurants are the anchor.
Two years later, Kamayan needed more room, and it stayed put. Rough Draft reported on July 30 that the Filipino restaurant had opened in a larger space next to its original Asian Square spot, with a grand opening planned for Aug. 8. The AJC called it "Kamayan 2.0," with about 100 seats and the same feel as the original room. When the move was announced in 2025, Rough Draft reported that the extra space would let the owners take on more catering and events and support TitaTito, their rice bowl delivery concept.
Kamayan's growth is good news for its neighbors too. A 100-seat restaurant that books events brings in groups who walk past every other storefront on the way.
The center's newest opening also came out of the corridor. Leng Wong and Jun Tay, co-owners of Bake and Bite, first met about a decade ago. Jun was a regular at a Chinese restaurant Leng owned in the Atlanta Chinatown food court in Doraville. They lost touch, then met again two years ago when Leng walked into a matcha ice cream shop in Duluth where Jun was working. Both were born in Ipoh, Malaysia.
They opened Bake and Bite this summer in Asian Square as a kopitiam, the Southeast Asian style of café where people linger over coffee and comfort food. The menu includes Ipoh white coffee, kaya toast with half-boiled eggs, nasi lemak with fried chicken and anchovies, rendang beef, and curry noodle soup topped with tofu puffs. Jun went to pastry school in Malaysia and, as he told 285 South, estimates the dishes taste "80 to 90 percent similar to Malaysia." One wall carries a phrase Leng copied into her notebook at a kopitiam back home: "Life is always a dream so keep your dreams alive."
Bake and Bite also isn't the only Malaysian kitchen in the center. Rough Draft's 2025 Doraville dining guide calls Mamak an Asian Square institution. So the new café opened next to an established Malaysian restaurant. Its owners clearly saw customers already coming to this lot for that food.
These are the Asian Square businesses we could confirm through their own websites or recent local coverage:
The 2024 coverage also named Quoc Huong Bánh Mì and BBQ Corner 2. We couldn't confirm their 2026 status, so it's worth checking before you go.
Paris Banh Mi's story makes clear that a busy lot doesn't mean easy margins. Lily Pabian, executive director of the nonprofit We Love Buford Highway, told Atlanta Magazine that rising costs and uneven customer traffic are hitting many businesses along the corridor. "If we lose our small immigrant businesses spaces, we lose cultures and the core identity of this corridor," she said.
The nonprofit's answer was to move Buford Highway Restaurant Month from August to June this year. They timed it to the World Cup and turned it into a soccer scavenger hunt: diners found soccer balls inside participating restaurants and could finish a 10-location challenge for prizes. The campaign page lists 25 participating restaurants. While the campaign was still running, 11Alive reported that about 1,200 game cards were activated in the first week of June and that participation later reached about 2,000. We haven't found a final wrap-up on sales or results, so those numbers only show early momentum.
"Folks mainly see the tacos, the Banh Mi sandwiches, and dumplings. So we work to raise light on the humans behind the talent and contribution." Lily Pabian, We Love Buford Highway, to Atlanta Magazine
This spring, John T. Edge brought a crew to film a Buford Highway episode of TrueSouth, the SEC Network food-and-culture show he writes and hosts. In his September Atlanta Magazine essay, Edge describes Mia Orino and Carlo Gan of Kamayan ATL serving "green beans blistered in coconut oil and rolled pork roast with skin as sweet and crunchy as peanut brittle." The episode also features Grace Yu of PN Rice Cake House across the road in Pinetree Plaza. Look for these October dates:
The festival is in Brookhaven, not at Asian Square. The 5K money goes to the same nonprofit that ran the June campaign for corridor restaurants.
Kamayan's signature feast, the shared spread it's named for, is a private event. You have to book it ahead, and it isn't served during regular lunch or dinner. The posted 2026 menu lists hours as Wednesday and Thursday 5 to 9 p.m. and Friday and Saturday noon to 9 p.m. Sunday hours differ across the restaurant's own pages, from a 7 p.m. close on the menu to a note that the kitchen closes at 6:45, so confirm before a Sunday visit.
During the 2024 construction, La Mei Zi could only be reached by car from the Shallowford Road entrance, and staff said parking on that side can't be seen from Buford Highway. If you usually come in from Buford Highway, try the Shallowford Road side. Some of the center's oldest restaurants are around back.
At Amy Tep, we follow places like Asian Square because they shape daily life across North Atlanta, from Doraville's kopitiam mornings to Duluth's dinner tables. If you're weighing which part of this corridor fits your routine, schedule your free bilingual home consultation. We're glad to talk it through in English or Vietnamese.
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