baron_beeza, I concede your point as your knowlege of engine timing etc exceeds mine. However, I have since that particular event used the same technique on several occasions with the same success.
I point out that the method I described was shown to me by my then Chief Pilot, and when the event I described occurred I was with another company and my CP was the company owner and also a LAME.
After arriving back at Port Moresby he asked me exactly how I started the engine and after I told him, his only reaction was along the lines of
'Fair enough, well done.' Knowing his background as a LAME I feel that if he considered it an unsafe technique he would have told me so at the time.