The first thing to know is that making paste is easy. It is basically a loose-cooked-dough-thing. Entomologically, the root of paste is from 'dough' and even earlier from a porridge made from barley (yay for years of Latin). Paste is ALWAYS plant based. It could be made from many things, but mostly it is cooked up rice or wheat flour. The higher quality (finer ground, naturally uncolored) the flour, the higher quality the paste. To this, you just add water and then cook it. It is kind of like making a curd. If you wanted to make this archival, then use distilled water... but for general craft stuff, I just use tap water.
I am using Zen Shofu Wheat Flour. It is nicer than necessary for making paste papers (i.e. it is super expensive) but this is the stuff I keep around for restoration projects when I need an archival and reversible adhesive.
Get ready, this is really complicated.
Put about equal parts flour and water together in a pot and heat the pot while stirring until it thickens. That's it. A quick disclaimer though... while 1:1 is the ratio, by definition, I generally use a water to flour ratio closer to 5:2.
You can buy special pots that will simultaneously cook and stir your paste for you, but I just use a non-stick pot and whisk the slurry over a med-low heat until it thickens and turns sort of translucent. It takes 10 min. or so. Because I am using this paste tomorrow, I am not worrying about it rotting before I get to use all of it. If I was going to keep this around for a while, I would stir in a 1/4 tsp. or so of thymol right after I finish cooking. BUT this is stuff that you really don't want to ingest. So.... If you do plan on adding in thymol, buy a designated 'paste pot' and 'paste wisk'. Otherwise, just use your normal cookware.
And yes, that is a metal whisk in a non-stick pot.... yell at me all you want. I buy cheap non-stick pots just for these occasions. I feel no guilt.
I should also mention that this basic 1:1 paste ratio will cool after cooking to make a rather firm gel. You can mix in water later (slowly cut it in and eventually stir it in) or you can mix in some more right after it is done cooking. There is no set consistency for paste; you thin it down until it is the correct thickness for the current project.
Also, store your paste in an airtight container until you are ready to use it. Of course, if it does dry out, you can just dissolve it with water. Which is great, because it means that all messes are fixable.
My source for wheat paste and thymol:
http://www.talasonline.com/
And I get my sacrificial non-stick wear from Ikea. And then I get meatballs. Good times.
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