Good food and enjoying time with family and friends is what the holiday season is all about. But if you are like me, finding the time to cook is always a challenge. So, I always find myself falling back on recipes that I can prepare ahead of time that are easy to make and taste great.

This recipe for curried fruit is an excellent side dish for many entrees and it has the perfect flavor for this time of year when it’s chilly outside.

Butternut squash is one of those signature flavors of autumn particularly when you combine it with some savory herbs and honey. This recipe is so simple and the way the honey caramelizes with the squash takes the flavor right off the charts.

If you are harvesting carrots from your garden, here’s a great recipe using ginger, honey and toasted cumin seeds to accentuate their sweet flavor.

Here’s a great tasting, simple recipe for a baked apricot dish that only requires 4 ingredients. Now I’ll warn you this isn’t for the diet conscious or those counting calories, but we all have to splurge a little.

Here’s a tasty twist on sweet potato casserole. Chef and cookbook author, Regina Charboneau gives this classic winter dish an update. Baked sweet potatoes are topped with a spicy fruit chutney. It’s easy to prepare, serve and clean up.

Regina Charboneau, chef at Monmouth Plantation in Natchez, spices up traditional sweet potatoes with bourbon, brown sugar and cinnamon.

This recipe for broccoli sauté fits the bill when it comes to being healthy and simple. Plus broccoli is one of the best foods for us. It contains certain phytochemicals that have been proven to help in our body’s defense against cancer and believe it or not, actually contains more vitamin C per serving than an orange. In fact it contains 200 percent of the recommended daily allowance of C.