I once burned a single Pengo a friend gave me. It burned, I read from it, it sits on a shelf.
I always tried to get high quality CDRs, mostly Mitsui. My last stack were ProDisc (?) generic (shiny red!) , and though they scratch easier than the Mitsuis, they worked, too.
If you want to archive data, get a better disc. But for everyday transfer or storage needs, most will work fine.