It was a joke to a degree. I am no mechanical engineer but my collogues often joke about how creating the donut is an important part of their unofficial curricu

It was a joke to a degree. I am no mechanical engineer but my collogues often joke about how creating the donut is an important part of their unofficial curriculum to learn handling CAD. They often refer beginners to it, so "have you modeled the donut?" may be the first question new people hear. They use different tools than blender for their mechanical designs, but I think it is actually a good introduction about the concepts of any modelling tool. It is also interesting for programmers that want to dabble with 3D engines because you know about the pipeline from modeling to rendering.