Salmon linguine with greens and butter mushrooms

Poach your smoked salmon fillets with a knob of butter in a large pan on a low-medium heat. Whilst these are gently cooking away, boil a pan of water 3/4 full for the linguine pasta. Once this has been brought to boil, add the pasta and reduce the heat – it will take about 15 minutes to cook the way through.

Your salmon should be nice and pink now so keep turning it over until the skin is easy to remove. Using a pair of tongues, remove the skin and break the salmon up into flakes, ensuring it has cooked all the way through.

Add the mushrooms to the pan with the salmon and season with the dried parsley and a douse of cracked black pepper. This is like poaching the salmon and mushrooms together in beautiful flavours, enriching the somewhat bland vegetables. Cut the ends of the green beans as some may have a spiked stalk and this isn’t pleasant to eat. Add the green beans into the pasta and let them boil for around 5 minutes.

Taste some of the pasta to see if it has cooked through, if there is still some bite then leave to boil for another few minutes. The pasta, once cooked, should be seamless to bite through, like you are eating silky ribbons. Drain the pasta and the green beans and add these to the pan with your salmon and mushrooms. Save some of the starchy water as you will need this to keep to mixture fresh.

Now all your ingredients are in one pan, add the garlic and herb cream cheese along with a splash of milk and stir through to cover all components. Just before serving, add the ladle of starchy water and stir through so the pasta looks full bodied and covered in a creamy sauce.

Serve and enjoy with a sprinkle of parsley and optional extra black pepper.