But that is just my opinion, others have varying opinions; and don't be fooled, they really are opinions and based on personal experience etc....
Weeeeeeel....no. They're not. While mine is an opinion based on personal experience, that opinion has the fortunate circumstance of being backed by decades of published brewing science, as well as hundreds of years of recorded brewing experience, which says that overpitching is as bad as underpitching. That takes it out of the realm of opinion and into established fact. Sorry.
KayaBrew, I suggest you harvest some of the slurry from your WLP051 cake - great yeast, BTW - and use the Mr Malty calculator to determine how much slurry to pitch. You don't have to wash the yeast, so long as you use it within a week or two. Just sanitize a clean Mason jar and scoop out some slurry. Consult the Mr Malty calculator beforehand so you can overshoot your requirements by about 50%.
Then clean your fermenter. That's my biggest beef about knocking out onto an intact cake: putting fresh wort into a filthy fermenter just gives me the heebies. I know all the arguments, I know - it's just nonsensical that you can look at all that gunk and call it 'clean'. [shudder]
Yeah, who is it that said that most of us grossly UNDER pitch yeast? I figure pouring the wort right onto the cake should be A-OK.
I'm one of the ones who talk about grossly under-pitching. In fact, I talk about homebrewers rarely taking the time to properly manage fermentation, part of which is to pitch an
appropriate amount of yeast. That means neither over- nor under-pitching. Can you make beer without paying close attention to your yeast? Yes. But the conscientious brewer carefully considers
all of his ingredients and techniques and how they interact. What drives me to distraction are those brewers who will carefully study and painstakingly select the choicest malt and hops, then delve deeply into water chemistry, then sift through the White Labs and Wyeast catalogs for the perfect yeast strain; once all that's done, they just toss in a smack-pack or vial - or pour their fresh wort onto a cake - and call it a day. All that knowledge gained, all that effort expended, just to stop short because they don't understand or even care to understand fermentation management.
I say it plainly, without intending offense: Knocking out onto a yeast cake is perceived as an advanced technique. It is nothing of the sort. It is a technique used by people who don't really understand fermentation management or don't care about the impact of pitching rate on their beer. (That last is for people who have tried the technique and not been bitten in the arse by it yet.)
Cheers!
Bob