Help me make slimkat even slimmer

I have been flashing custom ROMs for a few months now and none of them seem to fit just right for me. Slimkat come closest. They leave out most of the bloatware and give me a minimalistic interface to work with. The problem is I would like to remove even more. I tried editing a flashable zip of Cyanogenmod once. Simply deleting any .APK files I didn't want. Then when I attempted to flash it I was met with a flash failed message. Perhaps I removed an essential app?

How can I remove these unnecessary apps? I have tried using titanium backup to uninstall them,though they often magically reinstall at seemingly random intervals, and even when they do stay uninstalled I often find their dirty fingerprints all over my device I.e. Apps in my app drawer that launch nothing.

I'm trying to remove the following.

BasicDreams.apk Browser. Apk Calendar.apk Camera2.apk DSPmanager.apk Email.apk Exchange2.apk Livewallpaperspicker.apk Music.apk Phasebeam.apk Phototable.apk Visualizationwallpapers.apk

These are the apps I deleted from the ZIP last time I attempted this. I find all of these to be completely unnecessary. I've tried searching for answers myself but everything I see relates to ROM kitchens and the processes described baffle me.