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If you can find stoppers at your local HBS that fit them, you can use them for yeast starters or small test batches. Since it's clear glass though, you might be better off getting your deposit back from whole foods. Without a good cap and UV protection, they're not much use for bottling.

I often open one after a few days, and then I'll often open one every day or two after that. I find it interesting to see how it changes in the 2-3 weeks while it's carbonating. How many bottles are in the batch? Is it a big deal if you lose a few before they were completely ready? Another thing you can do is determine the carbonation level roughly by ...

Use PBW - it'll shift pretty much anything without requiring any scrubbing. LD Carlson's Easy Clean is not the same as PBW. Easy Clean is an oxygen-based cleaner, while PBW is an alkali-based cleaner. I've used both, and can say without doubt that PBW is much better for cleaning carboys. With PBW the hot water is not strictly necessary, but it does help ...

Off flavors come from process issues and sanitation issues. An example of a process issue would be over-pitching or under-pitching yeast, or over oxygenating or splashing while transferring and oxidizing finished beer. Sanitation issues are off flavors from microbial infection. I would say that most of the time off flavors are generated through process ...

I can't comment on Palmer's observations, I haven't had a plastics-related infection. Generally, from a scratch standpoint glass is better than plastic, when it comes to using carboys as fermenters. But only from that standpoint. Plastic carboys are superior in a lot of ways, but hard to clean because you can't just go at them with a bottle brush. ...