If you grew up in the shores of the Mediterranean like I did, I’m sure you are familiar with whole baked fish dishes. This baked whole Sea Bream dish with onions and tomatoes is called ‘tavë me peshk dhe qepë’ in my language, Albanian.
Mediterranean variations of baked sea bream dishes
Many Mediterranean countries use baked whole fish in their cuisines and the common thread is that these dishes use fresh ingredients like herbs, lemons and garlic.
In Greece sea bream is known as Tsipoura and baked sea bream is Tsipoura sto fourno. In Italy it’s called Orata and Orata al forno for the dish. Sea Bream in Spain it’s called Dorada and one of the dishes they cook with this fish it’s Dorada a la sal because the fish is encased in salt before baking.
In my native country of Albania we bake sea bream sea bass and other fish with an onion and tomato sauce. We call it ‘Tavë me peshk dhe qepë‘.
Sea Bream
Sea bream is an oval shaped fish, commonly found in the waters of the Mediterranean. It’s a white flesh fish, firm with mild flavor. It’s perfect for grilling or baking and usually cooked whole. When we used to pan fry this fish, we normally cooked it in fillets.
I live in Florida and here it’s easy to find sea bream already clean from the insides. I just cut the gills but you can also leave them if it doesn’t bother you. So here I just pat the fish dry and season them.
Back home, we would buy the fish almost off the boat sometimes or from someone who brought it fresh from the marina to the market. We usually cleaned the fish ourselves at home, didn’t freeze it. We usually bought it same day we were going to cook it.
Preparing the Onion and Tomato Sauce
Where I grew up we love this onion and tomato sauce to bake with the fish in the same baking dish. I hope you give this sauce a try but if you don’t like it, then you can add potatoes or other veggies instead:).
I make the sauce by cooking down lots of onions, then I add blended tomatoes and some tomato sauce, oregano, parsley, bay leaves, salt and pepper. Once the sauce is cooked to perfection, I transfer it to a baking dish.
Baking the dish
See recipe card below for details on how to cook this dish. I’ll take advantage of sharing some tips in this section to make it easier for you.
- chop the onions, cook them down, add all the sauce ingredients and cook until sauce is ready.
- clean the sea bream fish, pat dry, season with salt and pepper, lemon juice, cut the slits, add lemon slices, season with rosemary and parsley, oregano or herbs of your choice.
- pour tomato sauce on a baking dish, place fish on top and nestle them in, bake at 400 degrees F.
- serve with onion/tomato sauce and lettuce dill salad. Of course a glass of chilled white wine goes really well with it too:). Enjoy!
Baked Whole Sea Bream with Onions
Equipment
- 1 Wooden spoon
Ingredients
Sea Bream
- 3 sea bream
- 1 lemon
- 1 tbsp Mediterranean sea salt
- black pepper to taste
- 2 tbsps olive oil
- 3 fresh rosemary twigs
Onions / Tomato Sauce
- 4 yellow onions
- 5 garlic cloves
- 3 tomatoes
- 3-4 bay leaves
- 2 tbsps tomato sauce
- 2-3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp oregano
- 1 tsp marjoram
- 1 cup parsley
- salt /pepper to taste
Instructions
Onions and Tomato Sauce
- Roughly chop the onions and mince the garlic. Saute them in olive oil in medium heat and cook the onions down.
- Add bay leaves, tomato sauce and blended tomatoes. Add sea salt and black pepper.
- Once sauce is fully cooked, add to baking dish. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
Sea Bream
- Fish needs to be gutted and cleaned. Pat the fish dry with paper towel, season thoroughly on both sides with sea salt, pepper, lemon juice and herbs of your choice. Cut 3 slits on each side and add lemon slices in each for more flavor. Fill the cavity of lemon and rosemary (other herbs of your choice too if you like).
- Place seasoned sea bream over the tomato and onions sauce, nestling them in. Alternate head and tails so they all fit.
- Bake at 400 degrees F for about 30 minutes. If you like the fish to have a bit of charr on the skin, bake for 25 minutes at 400 F and another 5 minutes switch to broil. Serve with your favorite salads and more fresh lemon slices. Enjoy:).
Video
Notes
- Usually 3 fish of this size are enough for a family of 4 (with kids). If all your guests are adults, I’d get 1 fish per person.
- Preferably buy the fish already gutted and cleaned (Costco sells them clean like this) or ask the fishmonger to do it for you.
- Nutritional values are automatically calculated, use them as guidance but for more accurate values measure the weight and use a calculator.
Nutrition Label
Nutrition
If you would like to save this recipe for later, please pin one of the pictures to your boards in Pinterest so you can easily retrieve the recipe later on.
Let me know if you have any questions about the recipe or if you would like to adapt it into a different version for example bake the sea bream with potatoes instead of the onions/tomato sauce.
Thank you for reading my blog, it means a lot to me and my family!!
More Seafood Recipes
I love cooking fish, shrimp and other seafood dishes in general. I still haven’t published all seafood recipes that I make, but I’m trying one at a time. Feel free to check some of them out:).
- Salmon in tarragon sauce
- Shrimp, polenta and roasted tomato sauce
- Shrimp and cucumbers salad
- Halibut with couscous
- Baked red snapper
- Grilled cilantro lime shrimp
- Baked branzino and more:)
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