I only use containers to grow "gallions" -- green garlic scallions. In late winter when I have extra garlic, I use winter sowing techniques to get the cloves up and growing. The most common practice is to use a gallon milk jug. You cut 3/4 around the middle to make a hinged lid, punch drainage holes, plant in the bottom and then tape it shut and put it outside.

I don't think any container would be a fair variety trial because it would not maintain consistent temperatures. Even a 5-gallon double bucket, as is used for tomatoes, would get too warm at times, or maybe too cold. You would get some garlic, but it wouldn't be a fair trial.

Your winter plan is good, but it will be less work to plant garlic in the ground, with a better outcome. The only reasons I can see to force cloves in containers are for gallions or for transplanting in early spring.

I grow garlic in big containers and they are not only cleaner than the ones grown in my raised beds, they are also just as big. I am currently trying to clean up some stock I received from someone and am growing in a dozen plants in each of the 12" deep, 18" diameter plastic containers. I have had excellent luck growing this way. It seems that the garlic likes the extremes in temperature it experienced growing on a concrete apron with a southwest exposure--it gets really hot in those black pots when the sun shines and also quite cold when it gets down into the 20s and 30s. Garlic is not a delicate crop--it likes to be very hot and very cold, at least in my experience. I am not talking about Great Lakes cold or anything like that, just some Northwestern California cold.