Had another CC today…obviously from same bag. Liked it even less this time…edible but nothing special. I actually prefer Fuji. 
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A bad Fuji is better than a bad Red Delicious. Both are excellent at their prime, tree ripened.
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Just give me an apple that tastes like an apple.
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I had my first cosmic crisp of the year yesterday after enjoying them last year (although I did find them to be inconsistent as others have mentioned)… I had read the reports of bitter skin, but assumed they must be from people with more sensitive palates than mine as I hadn’t noticed it at all last year… but there was no doubt about it, the two had had yesterday had an unpleasantly bitter skin. Enough so that it made me want to stop eating the apple!
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Has anyone tasted bitter skin on a homegrown CC apple or a organic cosmic crisp apple? The funky flavour i tasted on the skin seemed like a chemical to me and especially since washing it and soaking it in a chemical reduction bath made it better (and yet not go away?) is what made me think they are using some funky new pesticide or fungicide. Which makes me worry about this apples DR
The organic apples have none of that
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Another thing: the CC apples I’ve gotten here have the most annoying adhesive for their stickers, unlike any produce stickers I’ve ever seen before. This was after washing, scrubbing with a brush, and vigorously rubbing with a kitchen towel (the black fibers are from the dish towel):
I wonder if it could be as others suggested and they are using a new kind of wax that doesn’t play well with adhesives.
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This stands in amusing contrast to a snippet I was just reading in the Michigan Pomological Society’s notes from the Bicentennial display of fruit in Philedelphia. Iowa apparently brought 342 varieties, heaped on plates and so perfect and shiny, the MI secretary suspected the use of wax. This was sniffed at in a superior fashion as “wax is something every pomologist deprecates.” 
Edit: CENTENNIAL display. It was 1875.
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I have not. But my husband’s uncle used to grow apples with no sprays, and a couple of his always had bitter skins. They seemed to correspond to less insect damage, too. I used to sit in his backyard and peel the apples with a pocketknife before eating them.
So… it certainly might be a spray residue, but my first guess would be that the apple can develop a bitter skin under some conditions.
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I’ve noticed vegetal flavor in some, almost like green bell pepper, or celery leaves or something. It is unwelcome. They’ve been quite hit or miss, even from the same retail outlet.
The first blister pack I got of them from Costco was quite good. The 2nd one I got a week or so ago, I wish I hadn’t.
I’ve also stopped buying Opal from Costco, because its too big a gamble for that many apples at once. I know they’d allow a return, but not worth the hassle.
edit: one big plus for the Costco blister packs is no produce label. I detest produce labels with a passion. Especially on fruits with a soft skin.
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I don’t like produce labels, but they are what makes it financially viable for my local markets to stock a lot of cultivars of apples and plums, without requiring the checkout staff to recognize them all. So I’m a fan.
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I also detest produce labels and somehow still one or two of them hop out of my compost pile. I do understand they help the store sell produce
Well im really hoping the tree ripened CCs have a total lack of the bitter skin, as that was my only real complaint other than some quality variation that all stored grocery apples can have.
@Ginda This is like a super metallic pesticide residue taste and the wax on the non organic ones was not the normal apple wax. It was not a taste i have tasted in apples before
I went out this afternoon and got a couple each of Cosmic Crisp, Evercrisp, and Pazazz. Mostly because these were the three would-be Superstar apples that were there today. I didn’t have trouble with the labels, which were more like Colorforms than stickers, at least for these varieties at this vendor. I left them on one of each, so I could remember what they were.
Of the three, I might go back for seconds on the Pazazz, although it was either less crisp to start with, or starting to go slightly mealy in storage. At least it had a decent sweet/tart profile. The other two were crisp as advertised, but otherwise not much to write home about. Cosmic Crisp was sweet, with a faint aspirin aftertaste, reminding me of nothing so much as the reviled Red Delicious - both in flavor and shape. Evercrisp didn’t taste much like anything at all. I will also say that only Pazazz SMELLED like an apple before being cut.
And then I went and recorded a podcast episode about American apple variety, the chase for the next Honeycrisp, and what it does to genetic diversity.
As one does. 
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It also tells the place of growing. I will not buy produce from certain countries.
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I don’t boycott fruit from any particular countries, but i do prefer for from some countries (and states) to that from others.
It’s interesting, I read several times that Cosmic Crisp has flavors reminiscent of Red Delicious. Cosmic Crisp is the child of HoneyCrisp and Enterprise. Here is the pedigree of Enterprise. Publication from Purdue University.
So there’s Delicious, McIntosh, Golden Delicious, and Rome Beauty in there as well as that Malus floribunda. But more Honeycrisp than any of the others, and more McIntosh than Delicious.
But maybe that’s where the 'Red Delicious" taste comes in. 
Whenever I read apple descriptions, I see something and think “I should try that one”. Here is PRI’s description of Enterprise, a disease resistant apple at that: " Flavor is sprightly at harvest but mellows to moderately subacid after storage. It is juicy with spicy, full rich flavor. We rate quality as very good at harvest and it improves after storage. Fruit retains its characteristic flavor and texture quality for up to 6 months in storage at 1°C. " But, I really don’t need another apple tree, so I will pass.
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Interesting. Genetics being what they are, Enterprise might favor the Delicious over the Mac. (You get 50% of your genetics from each parent, but assortment means you don’t necessarily inherit 25% from each grandparent. So if PRI 1661-2 and 1 both favor the Delicious side for flavor you’d get some pretty heavy influence in that direction). And would sort of also explains why I didn’t go for it. I prefer a much tarter apple. I’m not quite as bad as Dad, who happily eats green apples, with a little salt - but I definitely am not the target market for the new would-be Superstars. I view them as the K-pop of Apples.
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Just bought some CC from Sams Club. Very disappointed. Others I’ve had from other store have been GREAT. You never know what you’re getting with these
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It seems that Cosmic Crisp validates the club apple idea. It can be a very nice apple if properly grown.
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I’d say Honeycrisp too. Sometimes I wish they’d kept them where they produce good apples.
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