Creating a Clean, Minimal-Footprint ASP.NET WebAPI Project with VS 2012 and ASP.NET MVC 4

The default WebApi project template that ships with Visual Studio 2012 has a lot to offer in some respects, but is less than ideal for either learning your way through the impressive WebApi framework, or building a lean, mean API project with a minimal footprint. Here is how to cut down the cruft, and create a minimal WebApi project.