Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.

My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
(and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
conversations).

TIA,
Jack

On Feb 1, 8:32*pm, cruciverbalist > wrote:
> Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
> My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
> brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
> he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
> away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
> sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
> cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
> (and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
> conversations).
>
> TIA,
> Jack

I'm not sure how well it would work for baking because it's less sweet
than regular sugar and you would have to use more and that would throw
off the recipe. You could still use it for sweetening things like tea
or lemonade though.

On Fri, 01 Feb 2013 20:32:09 -0500, cruciverbalist
> wrote:

>Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
>My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
>brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
>he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
>away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
>sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
>cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
>(and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
>conversations).
>
>TIA,
>Jack

I've never seen it. Does it look like regular sugar, or what does it
look like?

Corn sugar aka dextrose is roughly 2/3 as sweet as table sugar aka..sucrose..so if a person was intent to use it for something other than beer brewing and maybe sausage making..would need to add a little more. The stuff is not overly expensive. How much of it have you got?

On Feb 1, 8:32*pm, cruciverbalist > wrote:
> Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
> My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
> brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
> he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
> away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
> sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
> cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
> (and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
> conversations).
>
> TIA,
> Jack

It is used in home brewing to naturally carbonate the beer. It is
added in small quantities to each bottle before capping. While the
beer is aging, the corn sugar feeds the residual yeast in the beer,
creating just enough carbon dioxide to carbonate the beer. BTW, too
much corn sugar and you run the risk of the bottle exploding in a week
or two.

Anyway, corn sugar is dextrose. It is used because it it isn't nearly
as sweet as regular sugar, a.k.a. sucrose, and thereby imparts little
sweet flavor to the finished beer.

This site: http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-corn-sugar.htm says it's
half the sweetness of sucrose. So, you could probably use twice as
much as there is regular sugar in a recipe, assuming the doubling of
the bulk wasn't an issue.

--
Silvar Beitel

On Feb 1, 8:32*pm, cruciverbalist > wrote:
> Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
> My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
> brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
> he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
> away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
> sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
> cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
> (and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
> conversations).
>
> TIA,
> Jack

Corn sugar and corn syrup are both made from cornstarch. So their
sweetness level should be about the same. Corn syrup, at least light
corn syrup that is, really isn't very sweet. It's gooey and syrupy
but it's not very sweet compared to white table sugar.

On Sat, 2 Feb 2013 15:50:43 +0000, bigwheel
> wrote:


>Corn sugar aka dextrose is roughly 2/3 as sweet as table sugar
>aka..sucrose..so if a person was intent to use it for something other
>than beer brewing and maybe sausage making..would need to add a little
>more. The stuff is not overly expensive. How much of it have you got?

Bigwheel,

Truth be told, not that much. Based on what you and others have said
(and I thank you all for your replies) I guess I'll just throw it out-
even though that still goes against everything I believe in. :-)

Jack

On Sunday, February 3, 2013 12:19:36 AM UTC-6, cruciverbalist wrote:
> On Sat, 2 Feb 2013 15:50:43 +0000, bigwheel
>
> > wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> >Corn sugar aka dextrose is roughly 2/3 as sweet as table sugar
>
> >aka..sucrose..so if a person was intent to use it for something other
>
> >than beer brewing and maybe sausage making..would need to add a little
>
> >more. The stuff is not overly expensive. How much of it have you got?
>
>
>
> Bigwheel,
>
>
>
> Truth be told, not that much. Based on what you and others have said
>
> (and I thank you all for your replies) I guess I'll just throw it out-
>
> even though that still goes against everything I believe in. :-)
>
You could caramelize it.
>
> Jack

--Bryan

On Feb 2, 4:49*am, wrote:
> On Fri, 01 Feb 2013 20:32:09 -0500, cruciverbalist
>
> > wrote:
> >Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
> >My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
> >brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
> >he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
> >away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
> >sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
> >cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
> >(and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
> >conversations).
>
> >TIA,
> >Jack
>
> I've never seen it. *Does it look like regular sugar, or what does it
> look like?


It looks like powdered sugar. Three quarters of a cup of it will
carbonate about five gallons of beer without adding any weird or off
flavors, which is why homebrewers use it. It takes about two weeks for
it to do its thing. A half cup of honey dissolved into about three
cups of almost boiling water works better, IMHO. It takes a little
longer to carbonate though.

On Feb 2, 12:14*pm, Silvar Beitel > wrote:
> On Feb 1, 8:32*pm, cruciverbalist > wrote:
>
> > Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
> > My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
> > brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
> > he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
> > away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
> > sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
> > cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
> > (and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
> > conversations).
>
> > TIA,
> > Jack
>
> It is used in home brewing to naturally carbonate the beer. *It is
> added in small quantities to each bottle before capping. *While the
> beer is aging, the corn sugar feeds the residual yeast in the beer,
> creating just enough carbon dioxide to carbonate the beer. *BTW, too
> much corn sugar and you run the risk of the bottle exploding in a week
> or two.


You definitely don't want to use more than a cup at a time. And make
sure that the fermentation is finished.

On 2/1/2013 8:32 PM, cruciverbalist wrote:
> Hey all. *Long* time lurker delurking to ask a question.
>
> My daughter and son-in-law recently moved out [ no comment ;-) ]. He
> brews his own beer and uses corn sugar in the process. When they moved
> he left behind a container of corn sugar. I hate to just throw it
> away. Can it be used as a substitute for granulated and/or powdered
> sugar? If so, in what ratio can it be substituted? I did a quick,
> cursory search on Google but didn't come up with anything definitive
> (and besides, asking here often stimulates more interesting
> conversations).
>
> TIA,
> Jack
>
Why not just give it back to the son-in-law?

Jill

jmcquown wrote:
>
> Forgive my ignorance but doesn't it cost money to brew beer? Money for
> equipment, bottles, supplies, etc? Seems if the guy could afford to do
> that he could have afforded to pay a little rent. We don't know (nor do
> I care about) the back-story. Just thinking I wouldn't put much effort
> into trying to use what the OP later said is a small amount of corn
> sugar for other uses.

You got it right, Jill. That leftover corn sugar was just trash, imo. She
finally got them out of her house....the hell with a bit of sugar nonsense.