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<p>Petros Papatheofanis fondly remembers stealing bacon off the griddle and being handed orange juice by the doting wait staff of his father’s North Center restaurant, Alps East.</p><p>Tuesday morning, he got to walk back through the same door with his mom — the namesake of the current space, Irene’s Finer Diner, and one of the many family members he worked alongside when Alps East was open, from 1986 to 2012.</p><p>Customers from the former restaurant greeted them both before ordering.</p><p>It came nearly two years to the day after the diner, at 2012 W. Irving Park Rd., was closed after a grease fire gutted the inside, though luckily no one was injured.</p><p>“My entire life essentially was in that restaurant,” Papatheofanis said. “It was a special place for us, so to get to open something in the same building my dad and mom and uncles worked, it was really cool.