Park Slope's Thanksgiving Week Starts the Saturday Before. Its Deadline Comes Even Earlier.

Thanksgiving is Thursday, November 26. In Park Slope the date that matters most comes eight days earlier. Wednesday, November 18 is the last day to order a Di Paola Turkey Farms bird online for pickup at the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket. Pickup is the following Saturday morning, a full five days before anyone carves anything.

Laid out on a calendar, the holiday stretches across eight days. It opens with a Saturday market at the north end of Prospect Park, includes a race morning, a free hike and a Fifth Avenue tree lighting, and closes the next Saturday at 4th Street. Most of those events have fixed morning windows. Holiday planning here starts with the turkey order and works backward from it.

The Order Window Closes First

The 2026 Greenmarket Turkey Guide from GrowNYC lists two farms with turkeys at Grand Army Plaza this year, and their terms are very different.

A 14-pound bird comes to about $70 at Di Paola and about $168 at Feisty Acres, a gap of roughly $98. Di Paola collects the balance at pickup, and card payments carry a 4% fee. The farm opened 2026 orders on October 9 and asks customers to allow 48 hours for processing, so the November 18 cutoff is the real limit.

Feisty Acres is the fallback, though a limited one. GrowNYC lists a "limited availability of turkeys" for sale at the market on November 21. Feisty Acres also sells turkey parts, whole roasting chickens, quail and Muscovy duck.

The weekend before the cutoff also has the Brooklyn Bird Club's Pre-Thanksgiving Birding in Prospect Park on Sunday, November 15, 8 a.m. to noon, led by Tina Alleva. The group meets at the Vanderbilt Street/Prospect Park Southwest entrance at 170 West Drive, and no registration is needed.

Saturday the 21st Is a Morning Errand

The Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket runs every Saturday, year-round, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Prospect Park West and Flatbush Avenue. On November 21, the window that counts is shorter. Di Paola says all turkeys must be picked up before 11:30 a.m. on market day. If you have a Di Paola order, you have three and a half hours to collect it and pay the balance.

The rest of the dinner can come from the same trip. GrowNYC's guide lists Brussels sprouts, carrots, fennel, winter squash, potatoes, apples, pears, herbs, honey, maple syrup, pre-made pies, butter and cream across Greenmarket stands, along with spirits and hard cider made from locally grown ingredients. For more on the plaza, read our earlier post on the two changes coming to Grand Army Plaza, only one of which has a start date.

The Turkey Trot's Errands Come Before Race Day

Runners have a deadline too. Prospect Park Track Club's 24th Annual Turkey Trot: Race for Reconciliation 5-Miler runs on Thanksgiving morning, but packet pickup happens before the holiday. Bibs are available at Brooklyn Running Company, 480 Bergen Street, on November 22, 24 and 25. Race-day pickup runs from 7:15 to 8:30 a.m.

The race morning has its own schedule:

1. Bag drop and bib pickup open at the LeFrak Center at Lakeside, 171 East Drive.
2. The first wave leaves Center Drive at 8:15 a.m., and the second follows at 9:00.
3. Runners finish at Harry's Wall.
4. The course closes at 10:40 a.m.

Regular bibs cost $47 and charity bibs cost $100. All charity-bib proceeds go to the American Indian Community House. 2026 is PPTC's fifth year partnering with AICH, which the club describes as dedicated to "promoting and improving the well-being of the American Indian community in New York and raising cultural awareness and respect." The race page says the club renamed the event in 2022 "to recognize the complexities of Thanksgiving and inspire a more thoughtful view of the holiday." PPTC has hosted the race for 24 years since taking it over from New York Road Runners. The club was founded in 1970, has organized races in the park since 1995, and has more than 2,000 members.

PPTC's page says spots "fill fast." In 2017 the club reported 2,204 runners and described the race as routinely selling out.

Friday Is the Only Day With No Deadline

The day after Thanksgiving is the one stretch of the week with nothing to order and no cutoff. NYC Parks runs a free Post-Thanksgiving Day Super Hike on Friday, November 27, from noon to 2 p.m., starting at the Audubon Center at the Boathouse. No registration is required. The noon start leaves the morning free, which is uncommon this week.

The Week Closes on Fifth Avenue

The second Saturday starts where the first one did. The Prospect Park Alliance calendar lists the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket for November 28, which makes it the first market Saturday after the holiday. That evening the Park Slope Fifth Avenue BID holds its annual tree lighting at the corner of 4th Street and Fifth Avenue, from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. The BID schedules the lighting to fall on Small Business Saturday.

This year Fifth Avenue has businesses that weren't open last Thanksgiving:

• Caputo Bagels, 81 Fifth Avenue, opened October 5. It comes from fifth-generation baker James Caputo and restaurateur Rafael "Rafi" Hasid, and according to Brooklyn Paper the menu covers hand-rolled sourdough bagels, sandwiches, pastries and coffee.
• Sesilya's Georgian bakery, 254 Fifth Avenue at Carroll Street, opened October 22. Brooklyn Bridge Parents reported that its restaurant is expected to open later.
• Voodoo Queen Soul Kitchen, 147 Fifth Avenue. The same roundup said brunch would start in November.

On Seventh Avenue, 16 Handles opened at 148 Seventh Avenue on October 24. For the avenue's earlier wave of openings, read our August post on Fifth Avenue's kitchens.

Here is the full calendar in order: birding on November 15, the Di Paola order cutoff on November 18, turkey pickup before 11:30 a.m. on November 21, packet pickup on November 22, 24 and 25, the race at 8:15 a.m. on November 26, the hike at noon on November 27, and the tree lighting at 4:30 p.m. on November 28.

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