Martha Hall Foose

As a child, Foose attended school in Yazoo City, MS. She later attended Jackson Academy and then St. Andrew's Episcopal School in Ridgeland, Mississippi.^[1] She went on to attend École Lenôtre in France before returning to her native Mississippi.^[2]

Foose opened Bottletree Bakery in Oxford, Mississippi in the 1990s.^[3] After opening Bottletree Bakery, she and her husband moved to Minneapolis, where she worked for Pillsbury as a writer and editor of cookbooks.^[3]

In the late 2000s she moved back to Mississippi, where she opened Mockingbird Bakery in Greenwood.^[1][3] From 2011 until 2021 Foose worked as an executive chef at the Viking Cooking School.^[3][4]

Foose was a food stylist for the movie The Help.^[1][3]

Foose currently lives in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. She previously lived at Pluto Plantation, her family farm near Greenwood and Tchula, Mississippi. The land previously belonged to her grandmother.^[3] She is married to Donald Bender, whom she met after opening Bottletree Bakery; the couple have one son.^[3]