OK, what about the ‘shredded beef only’ rule? Is it chili if it uses ground beef?
Chili is not a soup. Neither is it a garnish, a topping, or a sauce. It is a BEEF dish, made from chunks of BEEF, to which powdered chilies, masa, and various spices are added.
Chili is Texas food. It is our national dish. People from other states ALWAYS get it wrong. No one in Oklahoma knows crap about chili. That goes double for Califreakingfornia. And as for those liquid diaper contents they pass off as “chili” in Cincinnati — may God forgive them.
PROTIP: Chili is like sourdough bread or Philly cheesesteaks or New York pizza: impossible to duplicate elsewhere. There's some magic ingredient here — bacteria, radiation, pollution, whatever — that makes real chili unique and unreproducible. Do not eat “chili” made north of the Red River. Whatever you may be served up there, it will not be chili.