Across the desert horizon, a pilgrimage unfolds: the story of how personal healing became a shared path, and how Amentara is guided by deeper forces.
Christian’s Path of Healing
Amentara began with a personal healing journey. Christian’s path into ethnobotanicals transformed his life. His story is the root of Amentara: proof of the power a healed individual can have on his community and the world. Hear him tell the story in his own words
When the Goddess Manifested
The seed of Amentara was planted the day Christian and Gabriel stood before a statue of Tara — the embodiment of divine compassion. Beside them, a stranger named Erik noticed the mushroom tattoo on Gabriel’s neck and struck up a conversation. Within minutes, the three realized their paths were meant to cross.
What began as a simple exchange eventually became a vessel to share Tara’s love, Amanita’s wisdom, and the healing intelligence of nature with the world.
Our mission
Amentara exists to restore harmony between plants, people, and spirit. Through sacred ethnohbotanicals like Amanita and Blue Lotus, we help awaken the living intelligence of nature within each individual.This is the path of Tara or Sophia, the Divine Feminine energy rising through matter and consciousness alike. As we reconnect with her, we remember that true healing begins within and radiates outward into the world.
Amentara is more than a marketplace, it’s a temple and a movement toward integrity in plant medicine and education. From ethical sourcing and transparent science, to cultural reverence and instruction focused on personal transformation, every product, every lesson, and every ritual begins with one truth: the healing of the world starts within the individual.
Please browse Tara’s gifts and the wisdom to use them.
Welcome To
Our Path So far
From the first healing experiences, to the launch of our products, to the rebirth of MN Nice as Amentara, our journey is a growing root system. Each milestone represents growth, partnership, and our vision being furthered.
Christian gets off benzodiazepines
From quitting benzodiazepines in 2019 to making his first Amanita sale in 2021, Christian’s journey evolved from recovery to founding Minnesota Nice and pioneering the Amanita movement.
Resilience and Revelation
Christian and Gabe met Erik on February 10th. Their friendship and partnership around Amanita with him started shortly after. Then shortly after all of that, the founders 3 started calling upon Tara for guidance, were vindicated of an unjust federal raid, and saw a path forward for infusing this mushroom back into culture with the three of them as a team.
Milestones and a New Era
The launch of the Amentara rebrand in November marks a new era of growth and identity.
Growth, Challenge, and Resilience
From reaching 10,000 retail sales in May 2023 to facing a wrongful federal raid in November and still surpassing 20,000 sales a month later with Gabe joining as an affiliate Christian’s journey reflects relentless perseverance and success.
Rebuilding and Renewal
Despite being robbed by their manufacturer the team pressed forward. On June 27, 2025, the company celebrated its 50,000th retail sale. Shortly after, they relocated the business to Los Angeles and on August 25, 2025, their first order shipped out of L.A., signaling a powerful comeback and a fresh start for MN Nice.
Amentara’s long-held dream comes to life — a technoshamanic utopia where accessible plant medicine empowers healing for all.
Who We Are Now
Amentara is carried by people, not just products. Each founder brings a vision, a set of values, and a role in weaving this living ecosystem.
Christian Rasmussen
Founder & CEO
Christian Rasmussen
Founder & CEO
Christian Rasmussen is the founder and visionary behind Amentara (formerly Minnesota Nice Ethnobotanicals), whose lifelong fascination with sacred plants—particularly Amanita Muscaria—sparked a journey of personal healing and spiritual awakening. A background in physics and real estate gave way to deeper purpose after overcoming benzodiazepine withdrawal and discovering the profound teachings of ethnobotanicals. His path has been guided by serendipity, spiritual practice, and a devotion to nature, music, and personal transformation. Christian now leads Amentara with a mission to offer the most intriguing and beneficial plant medicines Gaia has to offer. His visionary leadership and relentless drive weave together tradition and innovation, ensuring the company grows with integrity while honoring the medicines at its core
Christian’s Recommendations:
Gabriel Hardie
Chief Marketing Officer
Gabriel Hardie
Chief Marketing Officer
Gabriel Hardie is the CMO and part-owner of Amentara, where he combines marketing expertise with a deep personal commitment to psychedelic education and responsible plant medicine advocacy. His journey began with a deep passion for psychedelic compounds in college, which later evolved into “The Launchpad,” a YouTube and podcast platform focused on psychedelics and esoteric topics. After facing legal challenges related to psilocybin and DMT trafficking in his early 20s, Gabriel doubled down on content creation, education, and business strategy. His partnership with Christian emerged from a shared vision: to make safe, effective, and ethically sourced psychoactive plants accessible to those seeking healing and growth. His gift for storytelling and community-building bridges the sacred and the modern, carrying the mission outward so these medicines find their rightful place in people’s lives.
Gabriel’s Recommendations:
Erik Casano
Chief Networking Officer
Erik Casano
Chief Networking Officer
Erik Casano is a breathwork coach, sound healer, and founder of Aquarian Alchemy, bringing a holistic wellness approach to Amentara as its Chief Networking Officer. Trained in 5-Element Breathwork in India, Erik specializes in lucid dreaming, trauma release, and the use of frequencies and breath to access altered states. His explorations with Amanita Muscaria as a tool for subconscious reprogramming have helped shape Amentara’s approach to healing. His direct connection to the spiritual and somatic layers of these medicines ensures that the company’s ethos remains rooted in transformation, not just transactions.
Erik’s Recommendations:
The Name: Amentara
Amentara was born from “Amen” and Tara: the divine syllable of truth joined with the name of the Great Mother herself. Tara or Sophia, is the embodiment of wisdom, creation, and compassion, the divine feminine that gives birth to form and consciousness alike. Like Amanita, Tara fulfills an ancient role as the bridge between heaven and earth, spirit and substance. We are here to facilitate that role. Hence, Amentara is the invocation, a call to remember the blessings of both heaven (wisdom) and earth (medicines).
Our Values have Deep Roots
Christian’s great-great-great-grandfather was Frederick Weyerhaeuser. He was one of the men who helped build America through the pine forests — and he did it not by cutting others down, but by lifting up his competition. This philosophy is clear as he, “convinced former competitors that greater benefits lay in working together toward production and investment goals.” At Amentara, we honor that spirit. Amanita Muscaria is a mycorrhizal mushroom that forms its strongest bonds in symbiosis with trees, most commonly Pine. This spiritual, familial, and cooperative connection is not lost on us.
Just as Frederick’s empire grew from pine, Amanita too finds life through pine. And just as he grew his legacy through cooperation and mutual benefit, we root our future in connection — becoming leaders not by hoarding knowledge, but by sharing it, nurturing community, and letting all who walk this path rise together
Partner with Amentara
Together we grow the garden.