• You avoid a eleventh hour crisis if preparation takes longer than you thought it would.

• Whenever you like to cook, you’ll have the leisure to enjoy what you’re doing rather than feeling frantic about a deadline

• You’ve time to cleaning after you cook.

• Whenever there has a disaster, say you burn something, you’ve plenty of time to come up with an alternate plan.

• Whenever you’ve prepared the dessert ahead, you don’t need to leave the table for a long stretch just when the conversation is getting really interesting.

Put your imagination to work for you! Try to imagine your way through the eleventh hour jobs you’ll have to get dinner negotiable, and reduce them to a minimum you feel comfortable with. It helps to think of what all those eleventh hour jobs are: setting about the ice water pitcher, lighting the candles, putting items in serving dishes and getting the guests to the table.

By the bye, many of these are jobs that your guests can do.

What is your level of tolerance for eleventh hour jobs?
Now ask yourself what your level of tolerance is for eleventh hour jobs? Whenever it’s low, then you should think of finding some recipes that absolutely minimize any eleventh hour work. This is especially true whenever you’re an inexperienced cook.

Some of the recipes I rely on are make-ahead, and some are just items that I can take home from the store and put out in nice serving dishes.

Some cooks even make everything ahead. Whenever you love stews, lasagna and casseroles, then you could do that too.

But I often prefer serving a delicious roast of lamb or beef or chicken as the special item on the menu. Luckily these dishes are ones you can cut in the oven and leave to themselves while you do other things.

Whenever you can add potatoes and vegetables to the roast while it cooks you’ve almost all of the advantages of make-ahead. Once you pop them in the oven beside the roast you can pretty well ignore them until they’re cooked.

So I tend to center on finding appetizers, salads, side dishes and desserts that I can make ahead, or set out straight from the store, or vegetables I can cook alongside a roast. Then I can concentrate on the last minute items like slicing a roast, making gravy, and getting things on the table.

Probably the most important category for me is appetisers. I find it too stressful to be fussing at cooking something while the doorbell is ringing. If you’re hosting by yourself you may find the same.

So I try to have a repertoire of make-ahead or buy-ahead appetiser formulas that work for me. Often I serve more than one, since some of my guests like to stick to very light appetisers, and others enjoy heartier ones.

You can build your repertoire of make ahead formulas for your house dinner parties. I suggest you start with appetizers. Whenever you prefer to see some of my favorites, just go to my Make-Ahead Appetizers page on my internet site.

Enjoy minimizing your hosting stress and watching your guests’ eyes light up at the sight of your tasty, well presented appetisers.