Sardines in tomato sauce

Written By Sandra on Thursday 13 October 2016 | 14:40



We are familiar with the importance of including fish in our diet and that’s why sardines make perfect choice for you. They are here during the whole year, they are cheap, and the most important thing – they are super healthy! Sardines are full of vitamins, packed with proteins and give you plenty of omega 3 acids.


The only “bad” virtue they have is the fact that they can be “heavy” to digest (especially canned sardines), so combining them with tomato sauce makes it much easier and digestible. I prepare this recipe often, and we never had any digest problems afterwards, so here it is…




Ingredients: 


Olive oil (3 or 4 spoons)

2 or 3 shallots

Garlic (to taste, 3 or 4 bulbs)

Red pepper (it works fine both with fresh chili peppers, or pepper flakes – you need about ½ teaspoon)

Regular paprika (minced red paprika, ½ teaspoon)

1 tablespoon tomato paste

500 grams cherry tomatoes (halved)

½ cup (125ml) white wine

¼ cut (65 ml) water

There was 1 spoon of fish sauce in original recipe, but I didn’t use it J

500 grams fresh sardines (the number depends of their size) – cleaned and gutted

Salt (to taste, 1 ½ to 2 teaspoon)

Freshly grounded black pepper (to taste, 1 teaspoon)

Freshly squeezed lemon juice



Use large, oven-proof pan.  Sauté shallots, garlic, pepper and paprika until shallots become soft and transparent (around 4-5 minutes). Add Tomato paste and mix. Cook for another minute, until tomato starts to turn brown.


Toss in cherry tomatoes and sauté for some 5 min. or so, till’ they release some juice. Pour the white wine, and water and simmer until it all begins to get thicker.

Remove from the heat


While cooking the sauce, turn on the oven (around 220 degrees). 


Now it’s time to prepare sardines.  Season the fish with salt and black pepper. In a large bowl whisk together lemon juice, olive oil and mix in the seasoned sardines. Let it be covered all the way.


Arrange sardines on prepared tomato sauce and put it in the oven, on the closest position to the griller (upper heater) and broil for some 10 or 12 minutes. Turn the fish in the middle of broiling (after some 6 minutes).

Sardines are finished when they are brown and crispy and their meat comes off their bone. 



Don’t overcook them .
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