Baked fresh anchovies with sweet tomato sauce

This is a very popular recipe and one of the most common ways to cook fresh anchovies in the Greek cuisine. Delicious as a main meal along with a crispy green salad or as a meze to share next to other similar dishes. Fresh anchovies can be found in Greece in a couple of different sizes. The larger is the most expensive and usually is gutted and often filleted and the smaller size can be eaten whole. In both cases though, and this is very essential for this fish, we take off the heads. Even when we have the smaller size which the bones are very thin and the fish can be eaten whole, the heads always have to go

Adapted from a recipe of Niki Mytarea,
from "Cook Book" magazine of "ETHNOS" newspaper

Ingredients (for 4 people):
1Kg of  fresh anchovies
1 tea-cup of olive oil
4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
500gr. of ripe tomatoes, coarsely grated
1 bunch of flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
a few leaves of fresh oregano, finely chopped (or 1/2 tsp of dried)
½ a tea-cup of water
½ a glass of white dry wine (optional -my addition)
1 tsp of sugar (optional -my addition to break up the acidity of the tomatoes)
salt
pepper

Method:
Clean the fish of their heads and their guts. Rinse well under running water, season with salt and leave in a colander to drain.

Preheat the oven to 200°C.

In a heavy bottomed wide frying pan warm the oil in medium heat and lightly sauté the garlic. Pour over with the wine (if used), add the tomatoes, the sugar (if used), the water, season with salt and pepper and stir.

Simmer the sauce in medium-low heat until it starts thickening up and then take the pan off the heat. Add the parsley and stir.

Empty the tomato sauce in an oven pan and array on top the anchovies in one layer. Put in the oven and bake for about 20 more minutes. During the cooking time shake the pan 1-2 times without stirring with a spoon so to allow the sauce to coat the fish.

When the food is ready take out of the oven sprinkle with the oregano and serve immediately.