The grocery list in the Governor's Mansion kitchen reads: Bagel Bites, ice cream, white bread, rye bread, Fruity Pebbles and Honey Combs.

Andy Marchant, the mansion's new executive chef, might want to add one more item: lite syrup. (He's just finishing up his first week on the job, so he knows he has a lot to learn about the Sanford family's favorite foods.)

During a recent breakfast in the elegant house First Lady Jenny Sanford is striving to turn into a comfortable home, the mother of four discovered her sons didn't like the syrup in the mansion's pantry.

In a normal household, Mom would have stocked the cupboard with the "right" syrup.

But life as a first lady doesn't include too many trips to the Piggly-Wiggly - one of the little adjustments Sanford finds herself making. Her husband, Gov. Mark Sanford, was sworn in Jan. 15, and then the family took up residence in the mansion.

"Something so mundane as syrup," Sanford said, sitting in a formal parlor on the mansion's first floor. "I'd always bought lite syrup."

ADJUSTING TO THE MANSION

In the first family's previous life on Sullivan's Island, Jenny Sanford occasionally hired people to help with laundry and cleaning. She also had a regular baby-sitter the family continues to employ with their own funds. But mostly, she is a woman accustomed to running her own house.

"I have always enjoyed cooking," she said.

It was not unusual, she said, for her husband to call and say he was bringing friends or business associates home for dinner. During the campaign, you never knew who might end up at the dinner table. Jenny Sanford would throw together a soup or her husband's favorite butterbean dish, and prepare the family's beach house for an evening with guests.

Life is different in the Governor's Mansion.

Sanford now has at her service a mansion staff that includes an executive chef and three cooks, a special events coordinator, a head steward, three additional stewards, a laundry worker, a dishwasher and other on-call staff.

And then there's Marchant, who as executive chef will take on some of the duties previously handled by the mansion's executive director. That job, with its $80,000 salary, was cut by the Sanfords to save money.

Marchant will make $56,000 - about $6,000 less than his predecessor - to not only supervise the kitchen staff but also oversee other mansion staff and events planning.

As the 37-year-old father of two young boys, Marchant has no problem understanding Jenny Sanford's dilemmas about simple things such as syrup for her sons.

The Sanfords have four boys: Marshall, 10; Landon, 9; Blake, 4; and Bolton, who will turn 7 on Sunday.

Marchant, who succeeds his friend and colleague Bruce Sacino, said Jenny Sanford remarked to him during his interview, "There will be little boys running around and invading your kitchen."

He responded: "Mrs. Sanford, I will be invading your kitchen."

Sanford said she felt "great comfort" in Marchant's attitudes about family and his "willingness to roll his sleeves up."

One of a half dozen people interviewed, he had been highly recommended by Sacino after he accepted the position of executive chef at Augusta National Golf Club.

Marchant is a Lexington native who most recently served for four years as executive chef of Tronco's Catering.

At 21, Marchant opened his own restaurant, Cinnamon Hill in Lexington. The upkeep of the older home that housed the eatery and the growth of restaurants in the Vista forced Marchant and his partner to close Cinnamon Hill in 1999, but the experience was invaluable, he said.

Marchant sees his time at Tronco's in the same light. There, he oversaw the preparation of hundreds, sometimes thousands, of meals a day, using a variety of cooking styles.

"What a training ground," he said as he put finishing touches on a luncheon salad of marinated pan-seared duck.

A KITCHEN TO ENVY

Marchant said he and Jenny Sanford will work together to find ways to increase efficiency at the mansion.

She won't be doing the cooking every day, but she has asked Marchant to show her a few survival skills in the top-of-the-line, restaurant-style kitchen.

"I'm afraid I'll blow something up," Sanford said. "It's not the type of kitchen where you walk right in and make a grilled cheese."

The kitchen features two six-burner, stainless-steel ranges, a commercial-grade grill, fryer and griddle, double convection ovens, two walk-in refrigerators, a walk-in freezer, several dry storage areas and three sets of china, one for every day and two for formal meals. The large space would be the envy of many restaurant chefs.

Sanford said she's also working with Marchant to find a dining routine that helps her preserve some family normalcy. There is no kitchen in the upstairs family quarters, so meals must be brought up on carts.

She's leaning toward using a smaller dining room on the first floor, closer to the kitchen. The Sanfords also tried picnics on the grounds.

But from the downstairs dining room, the Sanford boys can clear their plates from the table and carry them to the kitchen. Or she or her husband can step into the kitchen for ketchup - or some other item little boys are likely to request after everyone is seated at the table.

"We're a meat-and-potatoes kind of family ‘.‘.‘. pork, chicken ‘.‘.‘. the occasional taco and cheeseburger," Jenny Sanford said. "My youngest, Blake, all he wants is chicken fingers."

All of that makes Marchant feel right at home, he said.

"She's up against the same kinds of things I'm up against (at home). They want potato chips, and I'm trying to give them apples and celery sticks."

Reach Askins at (803) 771-8614 or aaskins@thestate.com.