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'Breaking Bad' beers offer a taste of Walter White's double life

Anyone who's up to date with the hit AMC show “Breaking Bad” (and shame on you if you're not) knows things are about to get nuts. Super-cop Hank is onto Walt, Jessie wants to take the money and run, Mike is taking a "nap" down by the river, and Skyler is not-so-quietly rooting for Walt’s cancer to return and free her from the grim prison their marriage has become. When things get this crazy,
Breaking Bad Season 5 Cast Photos
Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul) and Walter White (Bryan Cranston)
Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul) and Walter White (Bryan Cranston) drink beer on \"Breaking Bad,\" and pretty soon, you can enjoy brews inspired by the show, just in time for the final season.Today

Anyone who's up to date with the hit AMC show “Breaking Bad” (and shame on you if you're not) knows things are about to get nuts.

Super-cop Hank is onto Walt, Jessie wants to take the money and run, Mike is taking a "nap" down by the river, and Skyler is not-so-quietly rooting for Walt’s cancer to return and free her from the grim prison their marriage has become.

When things get this crazy, it’s a good time to take a deep breath and have a nice beer, and that’s just what Walt, Jessie, Skyler and Hank can do (but not poor Mike – he’d leak!) right there in Albuquerque where “Breaking Bad” is filmed, at Marble Brewery. In fact, they can enjoy a pair of beers inspired by the two sides of Walter White’s family man/drug lord persona.

“We came up with the idea at the last minute as a way of paying tribute to the show,” Marble Brewery co-founder and brew master Ted Rice told TODAY.com.

There’s a 6.5 percent ABV India Black Ale called Heisenberg’s Dark, which Rice says has a roasty malt profile and lovely citrus punch courtesy of Australian Galaxy hops. This brooding beer captures the darkness that’s taken over Mr. White’s life - no word if each glass comes with a black pork pie hat and a pair of shades, but it should.

beer
Cast members from \"Breaking Bad\" enjoy beers at Marble Brewery in New Mexico.Today

On the other side of the scale there’s Walt’s White Lie, an India White Ale with a smooth and earthy malt base thanks to the wheat in the grain bill, and big tropical notes courtesy of the Galaxy hops. With an easy-drinking 7.5 percent ABV, you’d better be -- careful -- just like Walt, this mild-mannered beer might take you by surprise.

Rice says Marble will brew about 60 kegs worth of each beer, which will be available exclusively on tap across Marble Brewery’s distribution network in New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona.

Heisenberg’s Dark and Walt’s White Lie are not officially licensed by AMC, and they are simply meant as a tribute to a show that has become part of the local fabric and a friend to the brewery.

The cast and crew of “Breaking Bad” have enjoyed beers in the Marble Brewery taproom, and the brewery’s beers have appeared in the show on a number of occasions. The exterior of Ted Rice’s house was even used as a filming location last season, during the episode in which Mike outfoxes an assassin sent by the over-caffeinated Lydia.

Beyond the local connection to the show, Rice feels a brew master’s kinship with Walter White.

“You look at that underground superlab with all that stainless steel gear, and it makes me think about what I do as a brewer,” Rice said. “In the end, we both use shiny equipment to make things that people crave.”

Heisenberg’s Dark and Walt White Lie will both be released on August 8, a few days before the final season of “Breaking Bad” starts on August 11, at which time we’ll find out which Walt – dark or light – will create his legacy for the White family. Either way, we know it involves an M60 machine gun in the trunk of a Cadillac parked in a Denny’s parking lot.

The new season can’t start soon enough!