Can I use ANY LME for brewing?

Hi there. I'm new to home brewing. I'd like to know if I can use ANY LME for brewing and adding hops myself, vs using Coopers for example? I live in Peterborough, Ontario and can't seem to find any suppliers here. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated

Cheers,

Momma:
I'm at the same stage; tired of spending big $ for LME only to get thin body beer. Thinking of getting a growler of LME, doing own hops, adding some grain wort too. (I screwed up my first mash; LHBS gave me wrong malt)
Careful, as some LMEs suffer in flavor if boiled: Munton's is one. I'm experimenting on doing a hop boil in water and adding unboiled syrup to cooled soln. I'd advise you to try at least partial mash batches ASAP.
I looked your town up on map. You're close to some malt suppliers, no? There's one in NY state.
Seems as soon as I left Wis. home brewing took off. Lots of suppliers in Ohio, Wi. area.
Later
PS: Get John Palmer's book, it's excellent! 1/2 price on Amazon.
Good luck.

Any extract liquid or dry can be prone to caramelization during extended boil period. Search about late extract addition. I typically withhold about 70% of my extract until after the last 15 minutes. You do however want to get your LME from a high volume supplier for freshness reasons. It makes a difference in the final product and for this reason I tend to build recipes based on DME. In the cases I use LME I will by from a volume online source such as Northern Brewer.

This leads to my next answer. Can you order on-line and have it shipped? I'm not sure of the Canadian suppliers that are available or the cost to ship from the US. I have found that for me at least it makes most sense for me just to order supplies on-line from either AHS or NB. My closest LHBS that has a wide selection of supplies is a 40 minute drive. After drive time and gas I'm better off paying the $7.50 shipping charge.

Late extract additions are great for lighter color,& cleaner flavor. In other words,no cooked extract "twang". LME is more prone to darkening in the boil than DME. So,for example,if I'm using a cooper's can,I'll add that at flame out. Since the wort is still boiling hot,& pasteurization happens about 162F,covering & steeping a few minutes gets the job done.
You can buy,say, a 3lb bag of plain (read un-hopped) light DME & use half (1.5lbs) in a 2.5-3.5 gallon boil for some hop additions. Then at the end of the boil (flame out) stir in completely the remaining DME & the cooper's can. Or Munton's can,for that matter. See my recipes under my avatar for detailed examples.

If you aren't opposed to steeping some grains, I added 0.5lbs of Golden naked oats to a porter recipe that I thought was too thin. The grain is a golden color so it shouldn't add any darker color to a lighter beer. Our local beer expert told me this would add body. Boy did it and it made the beer just what I wanted!