1.Sift icing sugar and almond meal into a large bowl; discard any lumps. Stir in remaining combined ingredients.
2.When mixture becomes too stiff to stir, use your fingers to press the ingredients together. Turn paste onto surface dusted with extra sifted icing sugar; knead gently until paste becomes smooth and pliable.
3.Wrap paste in plastic wrap to keep airtight until required.
4.To make sugar syrup; combine sugar and the water in a small saucepan; stir over high heat, without boiling, until sugar is dissolved. Bring syrup to the boil; boil, uncovered, for 5 minutes without stirring. Cool.
5.Pour syrup into a screw-top jar, store in the fridge for up to 4 weeks.
6.Rather than brushing or joining the cakes with sugar syrup, you can use jams, conserves or jellies combined with complementary liqueurs or spirits instead. As a guide, for a deep 20cm (8-inch) cake you will need ¼ cup jam and 1 tablespoon liqueur (if using).
7.Warm the jam in a small bowl over a small saucepan of simmering water; strain the jam while it’s warm into another small bowl, then stir in the liqueur. Alternatively, warm the jam in a microwave safe bowl, strain it, then add the liqueur. Make sure the combinations of flavours marry well with the cake itself (see tips).
Almond paste will keep well in the refrigerator for 2 weeks or frozen for several months. Thaw the frozen paste in the refrigerator overnight. If you’re covering cakes with almond paste before ready-made icing, you will need the same quantity of almond paste as the ready-made icing specified in the recipes. This can be bought from cake decorating shops, but it is quick, easy and inexpensive to make at home. This is used to brush onto the cake’s surface before initially covering with almond paste, ready-made icing or ganache (to make them stick). The syrup is then brushed over the initial covering before the final layer of ready-made icing, or ganache, is applied. Jam combinations: Apricot jam and Grand Marnier or Cointreau or limoncello; orange marmalade and whisky; raspberry or strawberry jam and Framboise; plum jam and brandy; fig jam and rum or brandy; redcurrant jelly and brandy.
