Before you know it, the summer seasonals will be gone, and posters like this could spring up all over town.

Again, I’m out of town this weekend, heading to Rhode Island to pay Trinity Brewhouse a visit and suck down some of the new Neo Cascade Pale Ale from Newport Storm. But that doesn’t mean I can’t make a few suggestions for some beers to drink when you’re out enjoying the sunny, tolerably warm weather over the next couple of days.

Let’s start with some summer beers. First, if you haven’t gotten your hands on the Victory Summer Love Ale, you should do it soon. The beer started as a partnership with the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation (after all, Philly is the City of Brotherly Love), but now it has made its way north to the City That Never Sleeps. According to Victory, it’s a clean, lean, and refreshing, with a “floral aroma of hops [that] will segue in to well integrated, refreshing hop dryness of European heritage." To find it in New York, oddly, head north: it’s on tap right now at the Bronx Ale House, David Copperfield’s, and George Keeley.

Don’t forget, a lot of summer seasonal beers segue into autumn beers in a flash. Before you know it, Harpoon’s 100-Barrel Series Pott’s Landbier will disappear from shelves and taps (although not before an event next Wednesday at Blind Tiger), the big imperial pale lager Southern Tier Farmer’s Tan will fade away like a late summer sunset, and the Magic Hat Odd Notion Wild Ginger will give way to a new one-off in the coming weeks. If you like these enough to enjoy on an Indian Summer day, you might want to stock up now.

There’s some great news from New Jersey, where New Jersey Beer Company will open up their tasting room starting next Friday. The brewery has been in operation for only a couple months, so it’s great to be able to check out their beers all in one place and see a fledgling beer operation. In the meantime, if you’d like to get a little more familiar with their beer, you can check it out across the river in Jersey City at Star Bar or The Iron Monkey, or at arguably North Jersey’s best craft beer bar, The Copper Mine Pub in North Arlington.

Go out and enjoy those summer beers! I’ve got a train to catch.

It’s a very busy Thursday over here at Brew York, New York headquarters… mainly because there are too many beer events to attend tonight, and not nearly enough time.

First, over at Barcade, West Coast Beer Night starts tonight at 5pm. California, Oregon, and Washington are all represented with the list, which also includes the impeccable Ballast Point Sculpin IPA:

Ace Pear Cider
Acme California Pale Ale
Anderson Valley Hop Ottin’ IPA
Bear Republic Heritage
Ballast Point Sculpin
Bruery Coton
Dick’s Double Danger
Eel River Triple Exultation
Elysian Immortal IPA
Green Flash 30th Street Pale Ale (cask)
Lagunitas Wilco Tango Foxtrot
Moylan’s Dragoon
Nectar Humboldt Brown
North Coast Le Merle
Rogue John John Juniper
Sierra Nevada Charlie, Fred and Ken’s Bock
Speakeasy Winter Spice
Stone 14th Anniversary
Stone Cali-Belgique
21st Amendment Golden Doom

Meanwhile, just up the street and around the corner, Spuyten Duyvil is dedicating their taps (and a bit of their bottle list) to Warren, Michigan’s family-owned Kuhnhenn Brewing Co. starting at 6pm. Their list is also impressive:

On tap:
Mittelfruh Monster: Maibock 
DRIPA: Double Rice IPA
White Devil: Belgian-styled white ale
Hefeweizen
Imperial Creme Brulee Java Stout
Winter Wonder: Dopplebock

In Bottles:
Solar Eclipse Imperial Stout
Olde Brune: Flemish-style Oud Brune ale

Come with an appetite for big beers here… only the Hefeweizen clocks in at under 8% ABV, and the Solar Eclipse is a whopper at 18%!

Meanwhile, down in Park Slope, The Gate is pulling out all the stops for Smuttynose starting at 7pm. This list may very well blow your mind. On top of some super-rare short batches from these Portsmouth, New Hampshire brewers, they’ll also be bringing out the very first batch of their Pumpkin Ale. It feels like summer today, but one sip and you’ll be yearning for fall.

Smutt-a-roni [Short Batch #3]
Strawberry Berliner [Short Batch #7]
Apple Brandy Imperial Stout [Short Batch #8]
Rouge d'Shire [Short Batch #9]
Belgian Stout [Short Batch #10]
Tripel 2009
IPA
Smuttonator 2008
Wheat Wine 2006
Old Brown Dog
Star Island
Imperial Stout 2008
Big A IPA
Farmhouse 2009
Pumpkin

Oh, wait, there’s more? Sure, let’s go to Manhattan, where Burp Castle is holding their “Christmas in July” event tonight starting at 6pm. They’ll be pouring three winter beers: Pennsylvania's Troegs Mad Elf, France's Jenlain Noel, and Belgium's Gouden Carolus Noel. Oh, and Santa brought one more present: there’s also free fries from nearby Pommes Frites.

That should be enough to keep you occupied tonight. Good luck keeping your thirst quenched!

For all the whining I’ve done about festivals involving beer, yesterday’s Good Beer at BAM event more than makes up for it. The culmination of Good Beer Month is this showcase of great food and great beer, with nearly two dozen restaurants and beers represented. The festival, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), was put on and sponsored by the Good Beer Seal folks, Edible Brooklyn, and Union Beer Distributors.

There was an exhausting number of options, but one of the highlights was Luke’s Lobster for staying true to their roots - their shrimp rolls were made with Maine shrimp, and they paired it with a Maine beer: Peak Organic’s Summer Session Ale. Co. made their fresh margherita pizza in a wood-burning oven on a truck, which saves me the trip and the wait over at their place on Ninth Avenue. Local breweries were highlights as well, with Kelso pimping out their IPA, Brooklyn Brewery opting for Dark Matter, and Captain Lawrence pouring Liquid Gold to pair with some savory, meaty treats from Roberta’s in Bushwick. Fire Island’s Red Wagon IPA was the recommended pairing for Back Forty’s Pork Meatball Sliders, and Brooklyn’s Palo Santo served up a delicious squash blossom quesadilla to wash down with McNeill’s Blonde Bombshell. On Village Voice, Fork in the Road called the winner: Northern Spy Food Co. served up a Rabbit Terrine that paired perfectly with the Southampton Cuvée des Fleures.

The food and beer were exhausting, which might be a reason why the event started early (4pm) and ended early (8pm). It gave everyone plenty of time to digest before bed and (hopefully) avoid a hangover in the morning.

Before Good Beer Month ends, there’s one more beer-and-food event: The Great Hot Dog Cookoff on Saturday at the Kelso Brewery in Fort Greene. Tickets are sold out, but the organizers had two cancellations this week and are offering two tickets at $50 each, with all proceeds going to City Harvest. Check the cookoff’s Twitter stream to see if they’re still available.

It’s the last week of July, and the bars with the Good Beer Seal aren’t slowing down. There’s a boatload of events this week, and even in the middle of the week, when you’re feeling like the weekend is nowhere near within grasp, there’s plenty of great beer to keep you occupied.

Tuesday: Starting at 3pm today, Rattle-N-Hum is rolling in a boatload of kegs from Red Hook-based Sixpoint Craft Ales, including some of the last of Signal, the smoked helles brewed exclusively for Good Beer Month. Here’s the full list:

Double Sweet Action
Gorilla Warfare
Autobahn IPA
Sweet Action
Brownstone
Bengali Tiger IPA
Apollo
Apollo Saison
Otis
Old Krusher
Signal
Righteous
Scotch Ale (cask dry-hopped with nugget hops)
Apollo (cask)

Wednesday: With its nearly-weekly events dedicating the taps to one brewery or theme, Blind Tiger Ale House is pretty much the only place to be for craft beer on Wednesdays. This week is no exception, as they bring in Two Brothers from Illinois at 4pm tomorrow.

Two Brothers doesn’t really blow out their good stuff in New York all that much, and while what we see here is a great product, Manager Alan Jestice is pulling out all the stops. The point of these nights, he says, is “to showcase and sometimes even reevaluate the way we perceive a certain brewery and the growth of their work - not even in the sense of quantity.” Jestice loves that patrons come to these nights "thinking we already know what to expect, and then suddenly [get] our socks blown off.“

Is that reason enough to go? I should hope so. Here’s the tap list:

Dog Days
The Bitter End
Domaine DuPage
Prairie Path
Ebelweiss
Cane & Ebel
Resistance
Long Haul
Heavy Handed IPA ‘09
Heavier Handed Foudre IPA '09
Public Domaine +10
Hoppy Public Domaine 
Oak Aged Domaine DuPage
Oh Brother!
Gravity
Bare Tree Weiss Wine
Port Wine Barrel Aged Bare Tree Weiss Wine '09
Red Eye '09
Imperial Cane & Ebel
Moaten
Hop Juice

This list will pretty much have something for everyone. And the folks at Blind Tiger obviously have a sense of humor, since they’re calling this event "Two Brothers, One Cup.”

I’m starting to get the feeling that Brooklyn Brewery brewmaster Garrett Oliver likes things that blow up. After this summer’s Braggot called Buzz Bomb, it looks like Brooklyn is going with the nuclear option with their next Brewmaster’s Reserve offering called Detonation Ale. According to Beernews.org, it’s the “big brother” of their popular Double IPA, Blast!, with seven types of hops and a heaping helping of English-style malts. Plus, it carries a big yet drinkable 9.2% ABV.

Keep an eye out for Detonation starting in mid-August. As with all Brewmaster’s Reserve beers, it’ll be draft-only and around for about two months.

This week, Whole Foods in Union Square (pictured above) became the fifth of their stores in Manhattan to sell growlers of draft beer. The taps are on the lower level next to the bread and nut departments. Right now, they’re pouring Blue Point Oatmeal Stout, Sixpoint Sweet Action, Greenport Harbor Ale, Victory Whirlwind Wit, and Magic Hat’s Odd Notion Summer 2010 Wild Ginger Ale.

This is part of a string of new entrants to the growler frenzy in New York. On Tuesday’s episode of Beer Sessions, when asked by a caller about growlers, Ray Deter of d.b.a. said he would consider them for his Williamsburg location. That’s not surprising, because The Pony Bar has made a steady business of selling growlers of their 20 taps. All three bars in the Upper West Side’s Dive Bar chain are all selling growlers as well. Most beer bars in the city are willing to fill a half-gallon growler for you, too, usually for around the price of about four beers.

In the retail space, where the prices are bit more reasonable, Bierkraft and Grab in Brooklyn have upped the ante when it comes to craft beer growlers. That’s on top of distributors New Beer, American Beer, Brooklyn Beer & Soda, and Brouwerj Lane that also fill growlers. On top of the new taps in Union Square, Whole Foods Markets in Tribeca, Columbus Circle, and the Upper West Side recently joined their Bowery Beer Room by offering draft beer. Outside of town, DeCicco’s Marketplace in Ardsley has made a name for itself for pouring an extensive list of craft beer in growlers. And as mentioned previously, Good Beer will be pouring growlers by summer’s end in the East Village (they just started construction this week). The list keeps growing and growing.

At the breweries, Chelsea Brewing Company has been selling their beer in growlers for years on Chelsea Piers. Captain Lawrence in Pleasantville pours growlers every Saturday afternoon. Now, as Bklyn Foodie mentioned this week, Kelso/Greenpoint Beerworks is getting in on the growler action by selling pours at their brewery in Fort Greene on Fridays from 2-7pm. Fresh beer is always the best beer.

Of course, with all these growlers, it’s becoming increasingly unnecessary to go all the way to a bar to drink your favorite tap-only beer. Now, you just have to walk to your refrigerator.