Any way to hide a product so it's only accesswible via a direct link?

I have a custom scenario where I have one item with about 10 different Options to choose from to order it. Explaining all the Options will mean my product description will be really long. I thought maybe I could break out the Options so they are each their own product. I could have someone do an Add To Cart on the main product, and then click a "Step 2" link that would go to a separate product to explain and let them "order" the product and then click a "Step 3" link to go to another product, etc. If I do that, I wouldn't want the "Option Products" to show up on the Recent, Most Popular, etc lists. I'd also want them to not be searchable either. Is there any easy way to do that?

If there isn't any extensions available for this type of request, I'd say it is doable but not an easy one to develop. I did thought on creating a dynamic page extension like this recently but the only problem would be knowing how would these custom products and product options be identified in the admin orders whether to know if that particular product has been purchased as a standard product or as a custom product along with the desired product options; especially when using the API from the admin orders since the custom products also needs to be identified on the email confirmation as a last resort.