The joy of the holidays is having a house full of people and good food. Familiar faces around the table, another bottle being opened, conversations moving from the dining room into the kitchen, and nobody particularly interested in calling it a night.

Maxwell Hospitality creates private dining and holiday events in North York, Toronto, for people who love to entertain and appreciate the care that goes into a truly good meal.

Led by Chef Jacob Maxwell Hoskins, our approach is intentionally personal. We take on a limited number of events, develop menus around each occasion and put the time into food that larger-format catering doesn't always allow for. Recipes are developed thoughtfully. Cooking is done from scratch wherever practical. Ingredients are selected for quality and seasonality, with an emphasis on organic ingredients and local producers when available.

Nothing needs to come from a standard holiday package.

A Christmas dinner with twelve family members deserves a different approach from an evening of cocktails for thirty friends and colleagues. An intimate engagement dinner should feel different from the annual holiday party you've hosted for years. We treat them that way.

Jacob develops each menu around the people coming, the setting and how you want the evening to unfold. For one home, that might mean oysters and passed hors d'oeuvres as guests arrive, followed by a generous family-style dinner. For another, it could be a composed multi-course menu served around the dining table. Larger gatherings might call for substantial small plates and beautifully prepared dishes that allow guests to move freely throughout the evening.

We can take into account favourite ingredients, family traditions, dietary requirements, the bottle you've been saving, or simply the kind of food you love to eat. Whether you're hosting in Lawrence Park, York Mills, Bayview Village or elsewhere in North York, the menu should feel at home in your space and with your guests.

Jacob has spent more than a decade cooking professionally across Canada and the United States, from demanding restaurant kitchens to intimate private dinners and significant private events. His career has included high-end weddings and large-scale productions, culinary leadership, menu development and restaurant openings.

He has cooked within kitchens led by nationally recognized culinary talent and for discerning private clientele, where discretion is simply part of the job. His work has also contributed to hospitality experiences covered by publications including Vogue and The New York Times. That experience shows up here.

It is in the stock that took hours rather than coming from a container. The sauce made for this particular dish. The produce worth buying because it happens to be excellent that week. The menu that has been considered as a whole rather than assembled from a list of available selections.

For us, elevated doesn't mean unnecessarily complicated. It means somebody cared.

Maxwell Hospitality creates intimate and larger-format private events throughout North York and the surrounding Toronto area, including:

• Christmas & Holiday Parties

• Private Dinners & Celebrations

• Engagement & Anniversary Dinners

• Corporate & Executive Entertaining

• Cocktail Parties & At-Home Events

Depending on the occasion, dinner can take the form of a seated multi-course experience, family-style service, passed hors d'oeuvres, substantial small plates or a combination designed around the flow of the evening.

And because this is a private service rather than a fixed catering package, we can think about the details with you.

You should be at your own party. Perhaps the greatest luxury of hiring a private chef isn't what's on the plate. It's being able to invite twenty people into your home in December and still be one of the twenty.

You shouldn't spend the first hour checking the oven, disappear halfway through a conversation because something needs plating, or realize at 11 p.m. that everyone had a wonderful evening except you.

Our job is to take care of the food with enough thought, preparation and experience that you don't have to think about it once your guests arrive.

You open the door. Pour a drink. Sit down when the food is ready. We'll take care of dinner.

Maxwell Hospitality accepts a limited number of private dinners, Christmas parties and holiday events throughout North York and Toronto each season.

If you're planning an evening at home this November, December or New Year's season, tell us a little about your guest list, your home and what you want the evening to feel like.