In this paper, cooked broccoli and carrot slices were cooled using four different methods, including vacuum, blast, cold room, and plate cooling. The cooling efficiencies of the four methods and the qualities of both vegetables after cooling were compared. It was found that vacuum cooling was the most efficient method among the four cooling methods. Since the weight loss during vacuum cooling was considerably reduced by spraying water onto the vegetables, the quality analysis revealed that vacuum cooling did not impose any negative effect on the vegetables qualities, in comparison with the other three cooling methods. Therefore, vacuum cooling combined with spraying water was proved to be a suitable and rapid cooling method for cooked broccoli and carrot slices. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.