The holidays are sliding inexorably toward us like that deadly rock in the "Indiana Jones" movie.

If you’re ever going to give a dinner party, this is probably the time of year you’ll do it. Fall is when we reconnect with friends we haven’t seen during the busy summer.

But how to find the time when everyone’s working like crazy, when kids and grandkids are flowing through the house, when commitments seem to mount daily?

Sauce.

It’s the dinner party-made-easy solution.

Of late, three sauces have come to be standard in my kitchen. With them I can whip up a respectable dinner for company at short notice and with little effort.

Protein + sauce + starch + salad + store-bought sweets = company dinner.

Grilled fish or chicken, a pot of rice or other steamed grain, the sauce, some Coco Puffs from Liliha Bakery just three blocks away, and I’ve got dinner. I also make unashamed use of prepared ingredients, such as banchan (vegetable side dishes from Korean takeout restaurants) or rotisserie chicken from the grocery store.

I guarantee you: The talk around the table will be about the sauce. You’ll get those gratifying little moans of pleasure, and all you did was whisk some stuff together in a bowl.

These are not cooked sauces. They are not the "mother" sauces, dependent on hours of reducing stock mixtures, careful attendance to temperature as you melt butter for a beurre blanc, mincing acres of aromatics.

These powerhouse three are the "busy auntie" sauces, though a chef probably wouldn’t consider them sauces at all. They are quickly combined mixtures of readily available ingredients — condiments, mostly, but dairy and soy foods as well — that last at least a week in the fridge and have wide appeal. They can be thinned to pouring texture or left at the consistency of sour cream and smeared on the plate for a restaurant-style presentation. They aren’t low-calorie but they’re high-flavor.

If you don’t like these, noodle around the Internet for the flavors and ingredients you do like.

Tahini-lemon-garlic

This mixture of sesame seed butter, fresh lemon juice, minced garlic and yogurt is as old as the sands of the Mediterranean. The only complicated thing about it is finding good-quality, reasonably priced tahini (sesame butter). On Oahu go to India Market, at Beretania and Isenberg streets.

I dislike canned tahini because it separates and must be emulsified in the food processor, a messy, time-consuming task. Also, the flavor is bland.

Choose a pungent raw (not roasted) tahini. If you can’t find tahini, substitute natural peanut butter (Adams, not Jif), found in any grocery store, or even almond butter, which I’ve seen at Costco. Then you have an Indonesian-type sate sauce, to be drizzled over skewered chicken or seafood on the grill.

Tomato-cream

Although it sounds European, this is actually a Euro-Indian preparation from Madhur Jaffrey’s latest book about her home-cooking style. It’s a recipe she first experienced in a restaurant in India: tomato purée, heavy cream, spices.

I make it with half cream and half Greek yogurt. It lasts astonishingly well and is particularly congenial to poultry, fish and baked or grilled tofu. You can vary the flavor with the Indian spices you prefer.

The only difficulty is finding garam masala. Try Whole Foods, a health food or Indian store, or go online. An easy-to-find curry mixture could be substituted, which would change the flavor profile but, I have found, is also delicious.

Miso-ko chu jang

The first time I experienced this "sauce" — a thick paste — was at Peace Cafe, a vegetarian restaurant on King Street, as part of a meatless, eggless version of bi bim bap (customarily a bowl of rice topped with grilled meats, flavored vegetables and a fried egg). I flipped! Salty, spicy, zingy, colorful — wow! I wanted to slather it on rice and just eat it plain.

I went online, found a couple of versions, tweaked them and sent my husband to heaven with kal bi from Kalihi Super Meats, this sauce, some banchan from Mama’s on Liliha and a mound of rice. How easy is that? I spent more time driving and parking than cooking!

This sauce is not for the timid; you can temper the power of the fiery ko chu jang (Korean chili paste) by using less of it and more red miso, adding a few drops more sesame, a splash more shoyu or cutting the sauce with water or dashi.