The Queens Night Market will end for the year Saturday and organizers are hosting a Halloween-themed day of events to mark the occasion. Vendors at a previous Queens Night Market Halloween event (Photo by Sharon Medina, Queens Night Market)
Oct. 28, 2022 By Michael Dorgan
The Queens Night Market will end for the year Saturday and organizers are hosting a Halloween-themed event to mark the occasion.
The season finale, which will run from 5 p.m. to midnight, will feature trick-or-treating, costume contests, dance performances, and live music.
Around 50 food vendors from around the world will also be on hand to offer their native cuisine. Vendors will provide items from a range of nations including Afghanistan, Ukraine, Indonesia, Portugal, the Philippines and Romania.
The Halloween-themed finale, now in its seventh year, typically sees around 100 contestants enter its costume competitions, organizers say.
The kid’s costume contest will start at 8:30 p.m. and the adults’ contest will follow at around 9:15 p.m.
Attendees dressed in spooky and creative outfits will be in with a chance of winning prizes such as a baseball signed by New York Mets pitcher Jacob deGrom. Other prizes include VIP-suite concert tickets at Forest Hills Stadium, gift certificates to the toy store Kidding Around and tickets to the Winter Lantern Festival at Queens County Farm.
There will be live performances by 10tecomai, a Japanese Yosakoi dance group, and the Werners, a Filipino acoustic pop trio. There will also be music by DJ Katie Honan as well as classical Indian sitar and tabla music.
The market first debuted in 2015 and approximately 2 million visitors have attended since, according to John Wang, founder of the Queens Night Market.
Wang said this year has been the market’s busiest despite challenges for vendors such as inflation and bad weather. Vendors are subject to a price cap, where they are not permitted to sell food items for more than $5-$6.
“The price cap we impose on food and vendors’ ever-shrinking margins mean volume is absolutely critical,” Wang said.
“Luckily, vendor sales were higher than ever, which means we will be able to pursue our mission of being New York City’s most affordable, diverse, and welcoming space for another year.”
Some of the new dishes on offer this year include Brazilian churrasco, Portuguese bifana, Malaysian roti jala, Thai boiled whelk, Trinidadian curry crab & dumplings, Mexican picaditas, and Ethiopian sega wat.
A person dressed in costume at a previous Queens Night Market Halloween event (Photo by Sharon Medina, Queens Night Market)
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