Training ChowChow versus German Shepherd
As far as I see it, Chow may be slang for food from Pidgin English from 19 century, and yes, those dogs were eaten, but that was not their main purpose. Chow (n.)
"food," originally especially "Chinese food," 1856, American English (originally in California), from Chinese Pidgin English chow-chow (1795) "food; mixed pickle or preserve; mix or medley of any sort," perhaps reduplication of Chinese cha or tsa "mixed," or Cantonese chaau "to fry, cook." Hence also, chow-chow is "mixed" (1845), since used as a noun in reference to various preserves or relishes.
The dog breed of the same name is from 1886, where some suggest a link to the Chinese tendency to see dogs as edible. However, in China, they call the breed Songshi-Quan, which means "puffy-lion dog" and not Chow Chow. While this breed started in the Han dynasty, the Chow Chow is a 2 thousand or so old breed that was developed or prevalent during the Chow dynasty, so one may have assumed that the name may come from this. Who knows?
Imperial dynasty of China from 1122 to 221 BC; during that era, these dogs were also mainly used not for food but they were used for hunting and protection and pulling sleds. The breed's ancestors may be traced 3000 years to regions north of China.
It is difficult to deny that every human race has a different culture and customs, and I, as a dog trainer, have seen that Chinese and other Asians like Japanese have a culturally different relationship with their dogs than European Western culture. They allow them to be more independent, which is not better or worse but different. That is being changed now due to the influence of Western culture. The Asians are or were more utilitarian, and thus, historically,...yes, they may have also eaten their dogs, and they still do.
If you look at most Asian breeds, they are of the Spitz family. Husky, Samoyed, Malamute, Akita, ( East Siberian)Laika, Shiba Inu, Kintamani, Kanaan dog, Korean Jindo, and so on,... and Chow Chow, As we all know, in comparison to Europeans, Asians do not have very pronounced facial expressions. That is why they do not require this from their dogs as well and do not breed these facial expressions into the dogs as much as Europeans subconsciously do. You know each dog is a picture of its owner. That is why it is hard to read a stoic stone face expression of the Chow Chow or Akita and so on, and that leads to misjudging of these dogs' attitudes. Now experienced trainers can read the attitude from body language, but the facial expressions are missing. On top of it, Spitz-type dogs are known to often be very protective, and that is why Spitz is also incorporated into the GSD breed. The protectiveness of these dogs was valued mainly as a family or personal protection against people and high territoriality. Akitas were dogs of Samurais used for hunting bears and protection. I have heard that these dogs were also used for fighting, and thus their thick coat protected them in fights or during hunts just as well, and expressionless facial expressions did not telegraph to the opponent the dog's intentions.
On top of it, due to their function as a protection dogs, these dogs, after maturity, would settle with only one person or family and have been thus incorruptible as guard dogs, and after a certain age, their transfer is difficult. Such loyalty and incorruptibility was valuable trait back then, but it may be a reason why it is difficult to "rehome" ( hate that word) dumped dog of this breed. Remember Hatchiko, the story of the most faithful dog? He was also a Spitz-type dog - Akita with very similar characteristics to Chow.
For all these reasons these dogs are difficult to be understood by people from the West who are used to dogs who warn and signal their intentions with facial expressions. Even trainers have a hard time reading these dogs, and that is why you can often hear that these dogs are hard to train. But if in order to estimate the emotions of the Chow you can learn to rely on their body language instead of facial expressions, and if you have a Buddhist type approach to the life and to this breed, then you will not have too many problems with this breed. But that may be a tall order for most people in the West. You can compare Chow to GSD, who is the opposite of Chow. GSD is a bred by Germans, and thus he is a command dog. If you treat Chow the same way as GSD, which is what westerners tend to do, then you will be in trouble with the breed of ChowChow. Such a dog does not like to be overly dominated. That again comes from Spitz-type breed, which is what I call a primitive dog breed or basal breed that predates the emergence of the modern breeds in the 19th Century,...thus, as such, it is the closest breed to the wolf. And anybody will tell you that training a wolf is different than training GSD or gregarious labrador retriever. Such, to a lesser degree, applies to Chow for any spitz-type dog.
So, in my opinion, if you know how to approach the Chow Chow breed, then you can have a great companion and fierce protector. Just do the dog's favorite and commit yourself to it for the rest of his life because rehoming may lead to tragedies and eventually kill off the dog. Do not buy Chow if you type A personality on one side and snowflake on the other. If you train a Chow, then it is best to train them through life and not with some rigid dog training class on which GSD would strive. Just live with the dog and let him know what is Good boy and what is No and use it fairly. Chow Chow and Akitas are the epitome of dogs who are partners in a pack. They need to be respected more and bossed less than GSD, but a firm leadership position must be constantly communicated to such dogs. Chows are not great with kids for the same reason. Children subconsciously rely on a facial expressions which they read on the faces of their parents and also on the faces of the dogs. And Chow just does not have them.
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