This is great. If I had my own company I would do basically the same:

1. have a look at the candidate's github / stack overflow profile. If you like what you see, invite him/her for an interview; 2. have a couple of pair programming sessions as you described, with different team members (and don't let team members influence each other during the hiring decision); 3. invite the candidate for lunch and see how he/she treats others (basically an asshole test)