“A dream has to start somewhere,” Donna Fang wrote in response to a Google review.

For Fang, that dream starts in a gas station.

Her small operation, Lan’s Kitchen, opened in a small stall at a Marathon in September and is the hospitality veteran’s entrepreneurial debut.

Fang has spent her life working in the family businesses, food-centric all: From her Korean-born father’s dumpling and noodle shop in her mother’s native Taiwan to her brother’s operation, Yumi Asian, a popular spot in adjacent Avalon Park, where she has been working since it opened in 2019.

“We stayed there through COVID,” she tells me. “We stuck it out and had a lot of amazing supporters in the neighborhood. He’s doing very well. His family is growing. At first, I had just one nephew. Now, I have two, plus a baby niece. One day, they will be working there,” she laughs. “And so I began thinking I am almost 40 and I have not built anything for myself.”

Similarly, Franceella Martin needed something to do after retiring in 2019 from a 33-year career as a civilian employee of the military. After waiting out the pandemic, she worked as a substitute teacher for a year before going full-time with the catering business she’d been offering to friends and family.

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Martin’s passion for cooking, inspired by watching her grandparents while growing up in Trinityville, Jamaica, has been lifelong. France-Ella’s Caribbean Cuisine is an extension of that. Here, she minds steamy trays of oxtail, curry goat, brown stew chicken and more, loading up weighty boxes for regulars and those who pass through and say the same thing I might have had I not had a bit of beat-driven intel to serve me: “I didn’t know they had food in here!”

Unlike her new neighbor, Fang, Martin’s business has called the Marathon home for two years.

“It’s a lot of work, but I love it,” she says. “I put the work in and it becomes the foundation, something I can pass on to other people when the business grows.”

And both women are hoping to grow.

For Martin, who prepares many of her dishes in a commissary kitchen at nearby Almendra’s Bakery, that would mean expanding the Caribbean offerings on the east side of the city.

“The aim is a brick-and-mortar where people could sit down, relax and be comfortable,” she says. “And I have never really seen a Caribbean restaurant that is buffet; I’ve been dreaming of that, talking about it for decades. I’d also like to have different restaurants. Keep this one open as long as it works and go into other gas stations, too.”

For walk-ins, signs posted indicate which dishes are cooked to order and implore customers to have patience. Fang cooks most of her items on site via hot plate and sans hood, an impediment she overcomes by offering 10% off to folks who order ahead online.

“That 10% is for you, for not rushing me and giving me the time I need to cook your food,” she says. “I don’t want to just scoop something and give it to you with you wondering how long it’s been there, I want to give you my very best.”

Among the best of Lan’s, for me, was the long-simmered tomato beef noodle soup ($14.95), with rich, tangy broth and meat so tender it seemed to melt away against the noodles.

“That’s a recipe from my father,” she tells me.

Sang grew up in Leesburg, where her family owned a Chinese buffet.

“Growing up this way, the family is always working and so on weekends when there was no school, our fun would be to go to the restaurant,” she says. “I’d follow [her father] into the kitchen and see him flipping the wok, cooking the dishes, making the dumpling skins. So many of the things I do come from him.”

A mostly one-woman show, she has three different fillings for her crispy potstickers ($9.95 for six; pork and kimchi was a win for me) and while honoring tradition, offers fusion items born of her twin backgrounds and a little Japanese, too, from her brother’s dabbling at Yumi. Things like the seared breast of the Tokyo chicken ($13.95) or Honey Peanut Chicken. All entrees here come with two sides, plus rice; we enjoyed the spicy cucumber salad and glass noodle options.

“For this generation, a lot of the kids are looking for something new, something with a different hit that they can’t get somewhere else,” Sang says. “I’m already hidden inside a gas station, so when they do find me I want to have something unique for them.”

For Martin, its the flavors of home that draw the regulars back (not to mention air-fried jerk wings so crispy you should probably just eat them in your car, lest you let that crunch go limp in a steamy box). She keeps most of the dishes mild for wider appeal, with a few, like the curry goat and spicy rice offering a little bit of heat.

That and her wonderful oxtail, smooth with the texture only collagen can provide, come in small and large sizes, as well as daily specials, which are smaller, more affordable.

With UCF nearby, both she and Fang offer student discounts, with Martin’s coming via a partnership with the university and a Yelp-driven app.

Both enjoy the cross-pollination each other’s businesses afford, as well, with Martin diverting some of her proceeds for charities that help children in both Central Florida, via Sunday food-pantry deliveries, and back home in Jamaica.

“Every little bit helps,” she notes. And that goes for both these businesses, as well. One up and running and looking to branch out (Martin has interest in grants that help small or women-owned businesses and has been looking around for affordable places to grow.) The other burgeoning, as Sang tries hard to put down roots.

Boyfriend, Luis, “does a lot of prepping for me,” Fang says, “but right now, business has its ups and downs, so if I’m not busy, he goes out Ubering to make extra money.”

She gets emotional thinking about the support her customers from Yumi have given her.

“Rents have been going very high,” she notes. “I’ve always been in family businesses where there was an actual restaurant but for me to put everything I have into that and have it not work…?” Instead, with help from those who enjoy her food, “who come see me, take pictures, post about it, leave reviews” she’s giving it a go at the Marathon, hoping they’ll enable her to run one.

“Even something this small is a risk,” she says, echoing that response to the review that praised her cooking despite her restaurant’s location, “but a dream has to start somewhere.”

If you go

Both of these restaurants are located inside Marathon Gas (13150 E. Colonial Drive in Orlando).

France-Ella’s Caribbean Cuisine: 407-480-0084; instagram.com/franceellas

Lan’s Kitchen: 407-403-1982; www.lanskitchenfl.com

Find me on Facebook, TikTok, Twitter or Instagram @amydroo or on the OSFoodie Instagram account @orlando.foodie. Email: amthompson@orlandosentinel.com, For more foodie fun, join the Let’s Eat, Orlando Facebook group.