[SOLVED] Minimal custom linux live cd with only essential software and least effort possible

Minimal custom linux live cd with only essential software and least effort possible

I want to build a custom linux live cd with only the absolutely essential software for my purpose:

run 1-3 simple web apps based on flask (python)
run 1-3 simple web apps based on sinatra (ruby)
run 1-3 simple web apps based on php
sqlite3 databases created on the fly
ssh server
NO X server
it has to be Linux, not other OS

It's not intended for actually burning to a cd, but to boot the iso file with a virtualization software (such as virtual box, vmware), creating a clean new demo environment with the web apps on every reboot.

It would be great to fit all this in the smallest size to make it a quick download. But I don't have the time or energy to learn building linux from scratch, so I'm willing to compromise on size and try to strip down an existing distro that is already tiny to begin with. But which one?

UPDATE

I ended up using TinyCore, and I was pretty happy with it! I built a hacking contest into it, all in less than 30 MB. You can download the CD from SourceForge and give it a spin in any virtualization software, or even boot your PC with it. The source code of the remastering scripts is on GitHub.

Solution