A galley is a workshop, not a show kitchen

Most narrowboat galleys are six to eight feet long, with a worktop about the size of a tea towel. Two rings, a grill, sometimes a small oven, and a sink that doubles as a draining board. You cannot cook the way you did in a house, and once you accept that, everything gets easier. Treat the galley as a workshop: tools within arm's reach, nothing left out that isn't being used, and a routine that gets you from ingredients to washing-up without a crisis.

Move the prep elsewhere. Chop on the dinette table, on the bow deck, or on a board balanced over the sink, then carry everything to the hob in one bowl. That single habit halves the clutter.

Storage that earns its keep

Storage in a galley is less about fitting more in than about getting things out quickly. Square containers beat round ones, because round tubs waste a third of a cupboard. Decant dry goods into flat bags or small jars and label the lids, not the sides, so you can read them from above.

• Keep a day box — oil, salt, pepper, stock cubes, garlic, a small knife — on the worktop. It saves a dozen cupboard raids a day.
• Use vertical space: a short rail of hooks under the gunwale will hold mugs, utensils and a folding chopping board.
• Store bulk rice, pasta and tins in crates under the floor or the bed, and rotate them forward as you use them.
• Line deep cupboards with a cheap plastic tray, so a leak is a tray to lift out rather than woodwork to mop.

One pot, one wash-up

Water is the real currency on board. A 58-foot narrowboat carries around 500 litres, and every litre used on washing-up is a litre not used for a shower. One-pot cooking is not a compromise; it is the sensible way to eat well afloat.

Learn four or five flexible dishes and vary them with what you have. Chicken and chorizo rice, cooked in one pan with the lid on. Lentil and root vegetable stew, started on the hob and finished in a sleeping bag. Pasta cooked risotto-style, with stock added a ladle at a time so the starch thickens the sauce. Bulk cooking pays twice: make enough for four and tomorrow's lunch only costs you one more pan.

If you have a thermal cooker or a wide-mouthed flask, use it. Bring a stew to the boil, seal it, and leave it while you cruise. It finishes cooking for free and does not heat the cabin.

The covered sauté pan is your best friend

If you buy one piece of kit, buy a deep sauté pan with a tight-fitting lid — ideally one that doubles as an oven dish and a serving bowl. It traps steam, so food cooks faster and loses less moisture, and it stops fat spitting onto varnished ceilings, curtains and the front of your jumper.

The lid matters most of all. A covered pan puts far less water into the air, and on a steel boat condensation is the enemy. A pan boiling hard for an hour can add close to a litre of water to the cabin, which then settles on windows, the hatch, the mattress and the inside of the hull. Keep the lid on, turn the heat down, and open the hatch above the hob and the front doors while you cook. Wipe the bulkhead behind the hob once a week with hot water and a little washing-up liquid; grease is far easier to shift before it bakes on.

Use the lid throughout the meal: sweat onions under it, braise with it on, reduce with it tilted. Keep the kettle lid down too, and fill it before you light the ring.

Cooking with the gas you have

Boat rings are hottest in the middle, so match the pan to the flame: a small pan on a big ring wastes gas and burns handles. Simmer rather than boil, and turn the gas off two or three minutes before the food is done, letting thick pans finish the job. Warm plates on the hob while you cook, use the grill rather than the oven for a single portion, and never leave a ring burning under an empty pan while you hunt for the salt. Fit and test a carbon monoxide alarm, keep the vents clear, and never stack crates against a low-level vent.

Six easy meals for a week afloat

• One-pan rice with chorizo, pepper and peas — everything in, lid on, twenty minutes.
• Lentil and carrot stew with a spoonful of curry paste, finished in a flask while you cruise.
• Pasta with garlic, chilli and tinned tomatoes, cooked in the sauce in one pan.
• Baked potatoes in the oven while the engine runs, with beans and cheese.
• Fish fillets steamed in the covered pan with lemon, greens and a splash of white wine.
• Full breakfast in the same pan: sausages, then mushrooms, then eggs, wiped between stages.

Cook this way for a fortnight and the galley stops feeling cramped. It becomes what it should be: a small, warm room at the heart of the boat, smelling of onions and coffee, with one pan to wash and a mug of tea waiting.