If you want to have a great trip with great food, you'll need to plan ahead. An RV galley usually has much less space than your kitchen at home, and you'll need to use every bit of it as well as you can. You also always to need to consider the weight of what you're bringing along in an RV, and all of your food and kitchen items will need to be packed and loaded properly.

When you're planning your meals, keep your travel plans in mind. If you will be going through more populated areas, you will be able to plan meals that require a regular stop at a supermarket for more fresh ingredients. If you are setting up camp in a remote area that is miles away from the nearest convenience store, you will have to stock everything you need before you arrive. You'll also to make sure that you only bring foods that will keep fresh for the time you're there.

Even if you are unable to buy fresh foods very often on your trip, you can still make a number of delicious meals without too much fuss if you plan ahead. Keep things as simple as you can; you don't want to spend all your time behind the stove or cleaning dishes and pots — you could have stayed home and done that. Think of creating the meals that you enjoy that use the minimum number of ingredients and utensils, as you will have limited counter space and storage areas. Don't bring along all the electronic appliances you have in your home kitchen; they take up space, add weight, and require power. An RV trip is a good time to reacquaint yourself with how your manual can opener works, or to dig out that hand-operated beater from the back of your kitchen drawer.

In a midsize trailer or motorhome, the typical RV galley has a refrigerator-freezer combination, two to three burners, an oven, a microwave, and a double sink. These amenities will not be the full-size versions you find in your home kitchen; they have been downsized and designed to work in the confines of your RV galley. Your cooking will have to adapt to the space you have.

RV refrigerators are smaller than and not nearly as efficient as your home unit, though they have improved over the past few years. Usually they are dual power, meaning they can switch over from electricity to gas cooling units as needed. You will find that food will spoil faster in your RV refrigerator. If you are traveling with children, pack powdered milk for use after the liquid milk runs out or spoils; this is a particularly good idea if you will be traveling somewhere where buying a quart of milk might require a 10-mile drive.

You'll find that RV ovens are small and have a limited cooking capacity. Preparing a large Thanksgiving turkey is probably out of the question. Beyond the oven limitations, storing the leftovers from a large meal is also a challenge. You can more easily make a traditional Thanksgiving dinner in your RV by cooking one of the turkey breasts most grocery stores carry (this will also eliminate the traditional fights that the kids have over who gets the drumsticks). Add side dishes of instant mashed potatoes and vegetables, and you'll have a tasty meal much like the one you'd have back home.

Other points to remember:

• Try to limit leftovers that can be difficult to store.

• Keep a variety of different sizes of heavy-duty (freezer weight), zippered plastic bags on hand for food storage.

• Transfer foods from glass to plastic containers before putting them in your RV. Glass breaks too easily in a moving RV.

• Stock your galley with items that can serve more than one purpose, or will be used on a regular basis.

Plan for storage of countertop appliances while you on the road. If you can't store it safely, don't bring it. Blenders and food processors are wonderful add-ons to well-stocked home kitchens, but in an RV galley, they take up valuable counter space and can become dangerous projectiles in a moving vehicle. Another consideration is the weight of the items you are adding to the galley. If you add a blender, you may have to eliminate another item that will prove much more useful in your travels.