HUNTERS POINT — LIC Flea and Food, the outdoor market on the neighborhood's waterfront, will return for the summer starting this weekend, according to organizers.
The market — which takes place Saturdays and Sundays on 46th Avenue and Fifth Street — is celebrating its fifth season, which is expected to include its usual array of food, clothing and art vendors as well as a number of themed, ticketed special events.
These will include a two-day "Beer and Taco Takedown" in July where guests can sample Mexican fare and unlimited brews, and another event that'll offer desserts with all-you-can-drink wine from Long Island's north fork.
In September, the market will host a barbeque food festival, while October will feature the return of of the flea's Queens Beer Festival, where attendees get endless tastes of locally sourced suds.
"We decided to incorporate a few more of these kind of ticketed events," said LIC Flea owner Josh Schneps, who is also co-publisher of the Queens Courier. "We kind of wanted to do something very similar to some of the big events that happen in Manhattan."
Tickets to participate in the special events start at $29, though entry to the flea market itself is free.
Attendees can expect to see some of same vendors from previous years, including the Astoria-based Butcher Bar, Japanese pancake purveyor Oconomi and Coney Shack, a food truck that serves toppings-packed hot dogs and Asian-inspired tacos.
The flea's beer garden will also be back. It will carry only Queens-based beers on tap most weekends, but will feature a different guest brewery during the first weekend of every month, according to Schneps.
"Just to mix it up and give it something different, [we'll] have the people from the breweries there to talk about the brewing process," he said, adding that the first weekend in May will include beers from Montauk Brewing Company.
The LIC Flea originally launched in summer 2013, and its organizers opened a second market called Astoria Flea and Food the year after on an outdoor film lot at Kaufman Astoria Studios.
Schneps said he'd like to bring the Astoria market back again this year but is not sure yet if it will happen, as it depends on the studio's availability.
LIC Flea and Food will take place at 5-25 46th Ave. from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. every Saturday and Sunday starting this weekend through October.
