2 Questions for Brewers

Been brewing for a while, but I have 2 questions:

1) I've primed with Belgian candy sugar, cane sugar and corn sugar depending on the recipe. But many recipes call for 1-1/4 cup of DME boiled for 10 mins. I did it once in a Belgian Trappist Ale and the beer came out too sweet for my taste. I think it was the DME used for priming, so now I'm chicken to use it again. Have you noticed a sweetness from priming with DME instead of other forms of sugar?

2) I bought a new green plastic trash can to put my lager fermentor in, while it's in my garage lagering at cold temp. This is northern Idaho and it's nice and cold her, but I didn't want it to get too cold, so I insulated the fermentor with big blanket. It's fermenting great at about 45 degrees. The question is this: I'm looking at this new big green trash can and wondering if I can ferment a BIG batch directly in that?

I know it has to be food grade plastic, but what does that mean? Is it safe to ferment in there? If not, what big plastic container can I use to ferment a BIG batch. I use 6 gal. fermentors now, but it would be cool to do a BIG BATCH sometime.

Any thoughts?

Thank you in advance.

John Trappist

DME would add some maltiness that sugar would not. but I don't think that such a small amount would actually make 5 gallons that much sweeter.

Food grade means that no odors from the plastic itself can leech into the contents...that the plastic is inert basically.

I would not ferment in a garbage can because there's no way its food grade plastic.

Thanks man!

There are actually liners you can get that are food grade. My local BOP place uses the large 12 gallon fermenters but they line them with these bags so they don't have to clean them. You might see if you can get your hands on some of those.

Thanks Brad! I'll check out the liner deal.

John Trappist