Thanks very much to everyone who watched, donated, or decided to bake for Comic Relief. The programmes were a huge success–they were were watched by a huge audience and helped to raise more than £250,000 for Comic Relief projects.

Because several people requested it, here is the recipe Ed used to make his biscotti. They honestly are very good.

Comic Relief Biscotti Recipe as baked by Ed Byrne

1lb2oz/500g white flour
1 tsp baking powder
1lb 2oz/500g caster sugar
4 eggs, beaten
grated zest of one orange
7oz/200g milk chocolate, roughly chopped
1 tsp vanilla extract
7oz/200g shelled pistachios

Heat the oven to 190C/375 F/gas mark 5.

Sift the flour, baking powder and a pinch of salt into a large bowl and add the sugar, eggs, zest, chocolate, vanilla extract and nuts, mixing well.
Divide the mixture in two and shape into long, thin logs (think of a slender, slightly flattened cucumber) on two baking trays lined with non-stick paper.

Bake for 25-30 minutes until firm. Remove from the oven, and lower the heat to 150C/300F/gas mark 2.

Leave the biscotti loaf to cool for five minutes then cut into diagonal fingers, spread out on the tray and put back in the oven for 10 to 15 minutes to dry out completely.

A couple of bits of news to wrap up the year:

Roaring Forties Tour 2013

Come along and hear Ed tackle some of the issues that are important, annoying, and funny to him now that he’s in his forties. He would be the first one to tell you that he’s been a miserable old git since the age of 23, but he used to try very hard to keep it in check. Well, not any longer. Where others might decide to buy a sports car, Ed is embracing middle age with a ferocity that… well… actually he might just have a nap in this chair first and then get back to you.

Click here for details and to buy tickets.

(We’ll be adding more links to the venues as the tickets go on sale.)

Underwater Volcano Disaster

In a new animation for the Oxford Sparks website, Ed narrates the story of Ossie, an intrepid explorer who gets buried under the sea close to Italy’s Stromboli volcano and miniaturises himself in order to escape.

The short film is the latest in a series of videos from Oxford Sparks, a web portal giving people access to some of the exciting science happening at Oxford University.

‘It isn’t every day that Oxford University asks you to play a rogue computer piloting a submarine inside an exploding volcano, so I couldn’t resist!’ Ed said. ‘I like the idea that by watching everything going wrong for poor old Ossie – as he gets shaken, shrunk and boiled alive – you’re actually learning something about how volcanoes are made deep beneath the ocean. It goes to show that exploring the latest science can be a whole heap of fun.’

Click here to watch Underwater Volcano Disaster at the Oxford Sparks website.

Ed’s just announced a couple of dates in Australia in October. He will be playing in Melbourne on Monday the 22nd, and will also have a gala performance in Sydney as part of the Just for Laughs festival.

Check out the Live Dates page for information on buying tickets.

As usual, you can hear the shows on BBC Radio 4 Extra at various times during the week. You can also listen again from anywhere in the world after the show has been broadcast.

The new series starts on Friday, August 31st at 7:30 am (repeated at 10:00 pm) with an Edinburgh special.

Here at Ed Byrne headquarters, we’re not really sure whose bright idea it was to let Ed loose in a lab at Bristol University for Volcano Live. And yet, next week you’ll be able to see him recreating the processes behind volcanoes under the close (very close, we hope) observation and expert guidance of some of the world’s leading volcanologists.

From the BBC website:

For Volcano Live, Ed discovers the principles behind volcanic phenomena. He deploys bottles of fizzy drinks, chewy mints, golden syrup, sugar, plastic balls and an oxyacetylene torch in a series of experiments. He explains why some volcanoes explode and others ooze, what a supervolcanic eruption would look like and how rock becomes liquid.

Obviously these people never heard about the time he cut off the top of his finger slicing carrots for his guinea pig.

Perhaps more excitingly for non-Ed fans, the programme will feature live reports by Kate Humble and geologist Iain Stewart from Kilauea, the world’s most active volcano, as well as reports from everyone’s favourite ash-cloud generator, Iceland’s Eyjafyallajokull and much, much more.

For all the broadcast details and extra materials, check out the BBC website.

Feel better about the some of the nightmare driving you’ll have to do during the school holidays by tuning in to BBC Two for the new series of World’s Most Dangerous Roads, beginning on Sunday, July 8th at 9m.

The first show in this series will follow Ed and Andy Parsons as they drive across Siberia, enduring more than 2,000 km of treacherous roads, spartan accommodations, and questionable food on their way from Yakutz, the coldest city in the world, along the “Road of Bones” to Magadan.

And if that’s not enough of other people’s road misery for you, later programmes in the series include Sue Perkins and Liza Tarbuck on the Ho Chi Minh Trail, and Hugh Dennis and David Baddiel in Ethiopia.

Ed and Jon Snow at last year's show. Photo by Darren Birch

Catch Ed and special guests including Jon Snow, Mitch Winehouse, Jimmy Carr, Rory Bremner, Stewart Francis, Ben Norris, and Adam Bloom for a one-off gig benefitting the New Horizon Youth Centre in London.

The gig is on May 14th at London’s Prince Edward Theatre. Tickets cost £15 – £40 and you can buy them here.

Last year’s gig was a roaring success, and this year’s also promises to have a good mix of standup and unexpected treats. All the proceeds go to support young people who are homeless or otherwise vulnerable or at risk.

(Here’s a little Digital Spy article about the gig.)

This just in! Robin Ince and Brian Cox will also be there on the night. You should definitely come too.

April 11th @ 9.00 pm April 12th @ 9.00 pm April 13th @ 7.00 pm April 13th @ 9.00 pm April 14th @ 7.00 pm April 14th @ 9.00 pm

It’s been a busy few months for Ed. A trip to New Zealand was followed by a visit to Siberia (!), then off to Austria for the Altitude Comedy Festival and a bit of skiing, and now Ed’s off to Oslo for four nights of gigs there as part of a bill with Frankie Boyle and Craig Campbell.

After all this he’ll be having a bit of a lie down, but he would like everyone to know that he’s written a new joke, so rest assured that work on the next show has begun.

…Ed takes to the Peak District for a lesson in landscape photography. You can pick up your copy of TGO from good newsagents, or you can subscribe and get it delivered to your great indoors every month.

In the January edition of TGO, Ed takes up rod and line and learns to fish. You might not want to rely on him for your post-apocalyptic survival needs just yet, but he’s getting there.

And, you know, magazine subscriptions do make very good Christmas presents. We’re just saying…